I randomly discovered Brad Marshall on the podcast Peak Human last week when searching for a new health related podcast to follow. In the interview Brad explains the ROS theory of obesity which basically looks at how the mitochondria uses the different types of fats we consume. You can go to the podcast, or several other interviews he’s done, and get a good overview of the theory or you can go to his website FireInABottle.net and read the blog article ROS theory of obesity. It’s actually a pretty easy, short read, but I’ll summarize my takeaways.
Basically, our mitochondria need saturated fat to operate properly and too much poly-unsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) will actually damage the mitochondria and cause them to split. This effect causes a whole lot of issues but the most important problem to me is it makes your metabolism slowdown. Another effect of eating too many PUFA’s is it prevents your body from getting the ‘I’m full’ signal aka satiation. So in short, your metabolism slows and you always feel hungry, which is a great setup for obesity! The problem is exacerbated by the fact that our pigs and chickens are fed a diet high in PUFA’s which used to be good sources of saturated fat. Thankfully cow’s turn the fats into saturated fat. Bottom line, eating PUFA’s i.e. vegetable oil, canola oil, palm oil, corn oil etc. are likely a primary cause in the rise of obesity in America, and now that these vegetable oils are making their way into the rest of the world they are following suit.
I highly recommend taking the time to read and understand this issue especially if you have struggled with weight loss. A lot of anecdotal stories of people changing out the PUFA’s for saturated fats and losing weight are becoming more common as this information gets out to the public. I am personally experimenting with this theory and have noticed that since I’ve switched to a diet high in Saturated fats I feel full much longer. Yesterday I ate 1900 calories which was about a 600 calorie deficit and I felt full most of the day.
I’ve linked everything I’ve seen on this so far, below.
The ROS Theory of Obesity – Fire In A Bottle
Introducing The Croissant Diet – Fire In A Bottle
Finding True Health 