Nutrients

Geschatte leestijd: 11 minuten Knowledge of the various nutrients and their functioning in the body is essential to understand how your diet should look. Whether it’s about losing weight or building muscle, this can mean the difference between reaching goals and disappointment.

What are nutrients

We can distinguish between macronutrients, or macronutrients, and micronutrients, or micronutrients, in terms of nutrients. These are often also abbreviated as ‘macros’ and ‘micros’. The micronutrients are mainly the vitamins and minerals and the macronutrients are the proteins, carbohydrates, and fats. The body needs both. The macronutrients are the major players when it comes to fuel supply, recovery, and building and maintaining muscles and organs. The micronutrients are no less important. They fulfill a large number of different functions in the body and are therefore indispensable. However, some can be produced by the body itself. Also, they are necessary in much smaller quantities compared to the macros.

Nutrients

The usefulness of these nutrients is clear: they play a crucial role in maintaining and repairing the human body. Physiologically, nutrients are necessary to perform all processes in the body. There are about 50 nutrients that the human body needs to perform all processes. These nutrients are divided among proteins, amino acids, carbohydrates, and fats, but vitamins and minerals also play a major role. The body can produce many of these nutrients itself, but for many others, the body relies on external sources such as food and fluids. For example, the body cannot produce dietary fibers itself and is therefore dependent on external sources. These fibers are responsible for a healthy intestinal flora and functioning of digestion. Fluid, often in the form of water, plays a crucial role in transporting nutrients. Additionally, fluid also transports waste products, often through perspiration or via the urinary tract. Finally, fluid is important in regulating heat and temperature.

Micronutrients

Because deficiencies in micronutrients are not common with a healthy intake of macronutrients, we will mainly focus on macros here. An exception is vitamin D. Vitamin D deficiencies are common in the winter months due to lack of sunlight. Vitamin D is an interesting micronutrient because studies have shown positive correlations between vitamin D and muscle growth, vitamin D and fat burning, and vitamin D and overall health. In separate articles, we will delve into these topics extensively. But of course, we will also discuss the role of other vitamins and minerals in muscle growth.

Macronutrients and calories

Macronutrients include proteins, carbohydrates, and fats. As mentioned, these are important suppliers of energy. However, the amount of energy and the way it is delivered differs per ‘macro’. Although we can indicate how much energy, or calories, each macronutrient approximately provides, there is a big difference in how they function in the body. Carbohydrates: 4 Kcal per gram Proteins: 4 Kcal per gram Fats: 9 Kcal per gram You can calculate the amount of energy you get per macronutrient. This is important considering the total amount of energy you consume in relation to the amount you expend plays a significant role in determining your weight.

Counting Calories

However, in practice, this can be easier since the same sources that show you the amount per macro usually also show you the total amount of calories. How to easily calculate how much energy you need, how much you expend, and how to keep track of this easily, you can read all about it in the article Counting Calories. In that article, I also emphasize that the ratio in which the different nutrients deliver this daily energy also plays an important role. I mention different possible ratios that can vary depending on the individual and the goal. But even if you’ve determined, for example, that you want to get 50% of your energy from carbohydrates, 25% from proteins, and 25% from fats, there’s still plenty of room for fine-tuning.

Determining Nutritional Needs

You can also say that creating a diet consists of three elementary parts, whether it’s about losing weight by losing fat or gaining weight by developing muscle mass:

1. Determine your energy needs
2. Determine the ratio of macronutrients
3. Determine the best sources to provide macronutrients

The first two steps already account for a large part of the success, possibly even the majority. However, there is a big difference in the various types of carbohydrates, the way they provide energy, and the extent to which they contribute to muscle, but also fat mass. The same can be said of the different sources of proteins and fats. In this article, we will therefore mainly describe the main differences per macronutrient. In separate articles, we will delve much deeper into these different sources of macronutrients.

Proteins

Proteins are the building blocks of the body and play an important role in repairing, maintaining, and growing muscle tissue, among other things. Proteins can provide energy, but they do so in a different and slower way than, for example, carbohydrates. Digesting proteins also requires more energy, resulting in effectively less energy intake. This explains the popularity of protein among athletes and fitness enthusiasts. Proteins are necessary for developing muscle mass but do not contribute quickly to fat mass.

Proteins and Energy

As mentioned, proteins ‘provide’ 4kcal per gram. However, that does not mean that the body prefers proteins as a source of energy. Although proteins contain 4 kcal per gram, the body much prefers to use them as building blocks. Proteins will only be used as fuel when there is a threat of insufficient glucose in the blood. So as long as enough carbohydrates are consumed, the body will not see the need to increase the conversion of proteins into energy. That does not mean that muscle mass is not breaking down at that time. That happens continuously. At the same time, new muscle mass is also continuously being created. This process can tilt in favor of creation (anabolism) or breakdown (catabolism). When there is sufficient glucose in the blood, proteins in the diet will promote the process of muscle mass creation. Therefore, generally speaking, there is no need to be too quickly concerned about a relatively high intake of proteins regarding the chance of body fat.

Proteins and Amino Acids

Until now, we’ve been talking about proteins, but in fact, proteins in food for the body are nothing more than suppliers of amino acids. Proteins are broken down into individual amino acids and short chains of amino acids after ingestion. It is the amino acids that can be used in the body to build tissue. Tissues like muscle mass are built by creating proteins in the muscles from amino acids. This process is called ‘protein synthesis’. To use protein as energy, these amino acids must first be converted into glucose, a rather slow process. Two amino acids, lysine and leucine, are not capable of this. Leucine is an amino acid that is mainly used for protein synthesis in the muscles. Protein is made up of 20 amino acids. These amino acids are essentially the molecular building blocks of protein. Of the 20 proteins, 9 amino acids are essential. This means that the body cannot produce these itself and must obtain them from foods such as beef, chicken, fish, or eggs. The other 11 are non-essential amino acids, indicating that the body can produce these itself.

Amino Acid Profile

The so-called amino acid profile of protein is determined by the types of amino acids it contains and the quantity of these. Another important property is the length and structure of the chains of amino acids that form the protein. Non-Essential Amino Acids

• Alanine
• Asparagine Acid
• Cysteine
• Tyrosine
• Glutamic Acid

Essential Amino Acids

• Histidine
• Isoleucine
• Leucine
• Lysine
• Methionine
• Phenylalanine
• Threonine
• Tryptophan
• Valine

Semi-essential amino acids

• Arginine
• Asparagine
• Glutamine
• Glycine
• Serine

Different proteins and muscle growth

The reason to critically examine which proteins you want to ingest usually has to do with their role in muscle growth. In this regard, we make a distinction between so-called ‘fast protein’ and ‘slow protein’. The most well-known examples of these are whey and casein. Whey protein and casein are two proteins found in milk. Of the protein content you see listed on your package of milk, about 20% comes from whey protein and 80% from casein. Whey is known as a ‘fast protein’, meaning that the amino acids in the protein are absorbed into the bloodstream more quickly after ingestion and thus become more quickly available to the muscles. In this way, whey provides a relatively short-lasting peak of amino acids in the blood, which is a great stimulus for protein synthesis (triangle in the graph on the right). Casein provides a slower, more gradual release of amino acids into the blood (circles in the graph). Research has shown that this contributes to a lesser extent to protein synthesis, but has a greater effect on limiting protein breakdown in the muscles. Considering that muscle growth is ultimately the result of buildup minus breakdown, both have an important role to play.

Protein powders as nutrients

You can also benefit from timing in this regard. That is also the reason why most people use whey and, to a lesser extent, casein in the form of a supplement. Protein powder has the advantage of providing a high concentration of protein. Another important reason, however, is that you can specifically choose one type of protein. By drinking milk, you get whey and four times as much casein. In powder form, you can take them separately. For example, whey immediately after a workout when there is a greater need for amino acids. Or immediately after waking up after nothing has been consumed all night. To limit this ‘nightly fasting’, you can choose to drink a shake with casein just before bedtime. As you can see in the graph above, this can provide available amino acids in the blood for half the night. This limits the need to break down proteins in the muscles. A good natural source of casein is cottage cheese.

Purity of protein powders

With protein in powder form, it is important to realize that different types of processing methods result in different degrees of purity. This can range from 70% for some so-called ‘concentrates’ to 90% or higher for the so-called ‘isolates’. Another processing method is not so much about purity, but about absorption rate. Hydrolyzed protein is protein to which enzymes have been added during the processing process. Enzymes that normally only start working in our body to break down the long chains of proteins into shorter chains. Because this has already happened in hydrolyzed protein to some extent, the amino acids can be absorbed more quickly into the bloodstream.

Carbohydrates and sugars

Most people get the majority of their daily energy from carbohydrates. Carbohydrates are also referred to as sugars, or saccharides. This can sometimes be confusing. For example, when the term “of which sugars” is used. If all carbohydrates are sugars, then what does this term refer to? Nowhere, to be honest. When the term ‘of which sugars’ is used, it refers to specific carbohydrates. Just as proteins are made up of chains of amino acids, carbohydrates are made up of chains of oxygen, hydrogen, and carbon atoms called ‘saccharides’. The nature of these chains and the number that together form a carbohydrate is of great influence on their function in the body.

Simple and complex carbohydrates

Carbohydrates that consist of only one or two chains of saccharides are classified as ‘of which sugars’ on labels. This says nothing about the origin of these sugars, so they are not necessarily added by a manufacturer, but can naturally occur in the product. An example of a natural sugar is fructose, the sugar that naturally occurs in fruit. These are also called simple carbohydrates. Other names for these simple carbohydrates are monosaccharides (one chain) and disaccharides (two chains). When it consists of multiple saccharides, it is called a complex carbohydrate. A characteristic of simple carbohydrates is that they are often sweet in taste. Complex carbohydrates: these are the polysaccharides and are formed by more than nine chains of saccharides. A good example of polysaccharides is starch. Starch is formed from 2 polysaccharides, amylose and amylopectin. These in turn consist of more than 100 chains of glucose.

Carbohydrates and fat mass

Before we discuss the importance of these differences in the various types of carbohydrates, it is useful to explain what exactly happens when you eat carbohydrates. Carbohydrates in food are broken down or converted into glucose in the body, the primary fuel for the body. By eating carbohydrates, the amount of glucose in the blood increases. This is what is meant by an increase in blood sugar levels. Too low or too high blood sugar levels can have dangerous side effects, and therefore the body has various methods to keep them in check.

Carbohydrates and insulin

When carbohydrates are eaten and the amount of glucose in the blood increases, this is a signal for the hormone insulin to take action. An increase in blood sugar also leads to an increased release of insulin. Insulin travels with the glucose in the bloodstream and gives instructions to various cells it passes (and binds to the cell receptors). Those instructions may include telling fat cells to convert glucose into fatty acids. In this way, excess energy can be converted and stored in the form of body fat. At the same time, the instruction is given to limit the burning of fats. The fact that we can store a lot of energy in this way is evident from the degree of overweight that is possible. This is therefore the main storage method of energy. So carbohydrates increase blood sugar and thus lead to the release of insulin. Insulin then instructs fat cells to store more fats. This is the main explanation given for why carbohydrates are often the first to be avoided in a diet aimed at losing weight. However, the type of carbohydrate you eat plays an important role here. The so-called fast sugars, especially the simple sugars, lead to a rapid peak in glucose like whey does for amino acids in the blood. This also leads to a higher release of insulin than the more complex carbohydrates, which provide a more gradual release of glucose.

Carbohydrates and muscle mass

Insulin also gives instructions to muscle cells. Namely, the command to make glycogen from the excess glucose. Glycogen is the form in which glucose in the muscles can be stored as usable fuel. Insulin also instructs to limit the breakdown of glycogen into glucose. With carbohydrates, you are thus loading the muscles with a quickly usable fuel. Important for athletic performance such as sports and training. However, the amount of energy that can be stored in the muscles (and to a lesser extent in the liver) is limited compared to body fat, which is why this is called the secondary storage of fuel. In addition to needing the energy to train intensively, carbohydrates and insulin have another important function. Insulin also instructs muscle cells to increase the aforementioned protein synthesis. By eating proteins, you ensure that amino acids enter the bloodstream, but by eating carbohydrates you ensure that muscle cells convert them into muscle mass. Carbohydrates and insulin also ensure here that the reverse effect, the breakdown of muscle proteins into amino acids, is limited. Because insulin has a tissue-building effect, it is called an ‘anabolic hormone’. Eating enough carbohydrates is therefore important to keep your body in an anabolic state if you want to grow in muscle mass. Unfortunately, this also has the effect of creating body fat, making building a lean and muscular body often a matter of targeted building and breaking down.

Fats

Finally, in the series of macronutrients: fats. Fats may have gotten a bad name over the years, but we can’t do without them. Fats play an important role in the human body. Fats are a source of energy for the body and help in the absorption of specific vitamins. Additionally, they play an important role in hormone regulation and provide protection when the body needs it. We can distinguish 4 types of fats:

• Saturated fats
• Unsaturated fats
• Polyunsaturated fats
• Trans fats

In addition, we make an important distinction between long-chain fatty acids and medium-chain fatty acids. Furthermore, fats do not always consist of just 1 type of fatty acid but often a combination of fatty acids. When dietary fats enter the body, a few steps need to happen to convert them into usable fatty acids for storage or energy. Fats contain more energy than carbohydrates, but make this energy less easily available. Good for storage, therefore, and for consumption when carbohydrate intake is low.

Fats and body fat

Fats and carbohydrates are alternately designated as the worst fattening agents. Fats because they provide available fatty acids that can be stored and carbohydrates because they order this through insulin and can themselves be converted into fats. The fact is that we need both. In practice, we can do with very few carbohydrates if we get enough fats and protein, but you often don’t feel very comfortable under those circumstances. These kinds of diets often turn out to be successful, which is not surprising. You teach your body to use fats as the first fuel and force your fat cells to burn them. The problem often arises when carbohydrates are eaten again.

Fats and muscle mass

Fats are also necessary as transport for fat-soluble vitamins and a healthy hormone balance. Hormones such as testosterone, for example, which is an important anabolic hormone. As suppliers of compact energy, fats also ensure that there is a reduced need to break down muscle mass. In the various articles about various fats such as omega-3 fatty acids and muscle growth, omega-3 fatty acids and weight loss, and medium-chain fatty acids (MCTs), we extensively discuss effects such as muscle growth, fat burning, and effects on health.

Nutrients in your diet

We try to mention the most important characteristics of the various nutrients here in a nutshell. Even if we take one very specific nutrient, we can discuss dozens of studies in our articles to describe this well. However, from a summary like this, you can take away the main points to set up your diet:

• After determining how much energy you need, it is important to look at the distribution across the macronutrients
• When you know how much you need per ‘macro’, you can critically examine the possible sources per nutrient and their effect on your body
• Carbohydrates are the main fuel for the body and can increase both muscle mass and fat mass
• Proteins are the suppliers of amino acids that can be used to build muscle mass, but also as reserve fuel
• Fats are important as suppliers of some vitamins, as fuel, and for hormones such as testosterone