Bodybuilding.com - Mauro Di Pasquale - Essential Fatty Acids And Dieting!

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Several studies have shown that fish oil increases insulin sensitivity.

Omega-3 and various other fats are very important in a healthy diet to help with cholesterol and various other problems. Learn more here about what it can do for you. Read on...

By: Mauro Di Pasquale

EFA's can be beneficial even if a deficiency doesn't exist and, if used properly, can increase overall health, and help you with fat loss.

Fish Oil

Several studies have shown that fish oil increases insulin sensitivity, the breakdown of body fat and the use of fat as a primary energy source. As such, besides decreasing inflammation and increasing cardiovascular health, they also provide substantial weight and fat loss benefits.

LNA, EPA, and DHA can enhance lipolysis (body fat breakdown), and decrease lipogenesis (body fat formation). The combined breakdown of stored body fat and decrease in additional body fat can have very positive results for the dieter. You actually end up making less and breaking down more body fat when using these oils.

Some products are effective in helping you to get rid of excess body fat when it's used along with healthy diets, in which you take in lower amounts of carbs and higher amounts of fats than most diets.

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Omega-3 & Cholesterol:

Omega-3 can provide an excellent hedge against worries about cholesterol. For example marine oils are a big part of the diets of Eskimo tribes. Though their higher-fat diet would seem to make them prime candidates for heart disease and atherosclerosis, they've been found to be almost immune to cardiovascular problems, at least until Western dietary influences in recent years.

Studies have centered on omega-3 fatty acids in the fish oils and their cardioprotective capacities as being central to this phenomenon.

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Even in cases where dietary cholesterol is increased, omega-3s may aid in actually lowering serum cholesterol. There is some evidence to suggest that in higher-fat diets aerobic exercise also reduces serum cholesterol and thus may improve the effects of omega-3 rich fish oil on cholesterol.

There's no doubt that the omega-3s are a major factor in lowering serum cholesterol levels, preventing coronary heart disease, and perhaps even preventing or curing atherosclerosis. As well, blood pressure, clotting, immune response, insulin resistance, and triglyceride levels are all positively affected by omega-3s.

But there's more to the story.

Since fat-free mass, and particularly muscle mass, is the main determinant of energy expenditure, the possibility of increasing or even maintaining muscle mass is an important consideration. That's where conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) comes in.

Numerous physiological effects in relation to body-weight control have been attributed to CLA in animals. In different animal models, CLA has been shown to reduce body fat and to increase lean body mass. A recent long term study found that a mixture of the two CLA isomers significantly lowered body fat mass in overweight humans.

As well, CLA seems to have significant effects on weight regain, as it reduces fat uptake into adipocytes by decreasing the formation of fat and but not affecting fat breakdown. It likely does this by affecting various enzymes involved in lipid formation rather than enhancing fat breakdown, known as lipolysis.

Thus there is an overall increase in fat breakdown since the two processes are usually in dynamic equilibrium with as much fat being produced as is broken down. Decreasing fat formation changes the dynamics to one of overall increased fat breakdown and subsequently a decrease in overall body fat.

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The Bottom Line

The bottom line is that the omega-3 has significant effects on weight and fat loss, and increases overall health and well being.

References:

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