I was heartened by this story that has been running for a couple of weeks but the University of Guelph did a very small study that found that Conjugated linoleic acid can help weight loss. I for one am hoping that we see more bigger studies to show us more about htis popular supplement as there are also some decent reports of the antioxidant properties of Conjugated linoleic acid.

The popular supplement CLA helped overweight adults burn fat, even through the holiday season, says a study by American and Canadian researchers.

The six-month study included 40 overweight people, mainly women, who were divided into two groups. One group took a daily supplement of CLA while the other group took a placebo, CBC News reported.

Over the course of the study, the people in the CLA group lost an average of 2.2 pounds of fat and tended to lose fat from the abdomen. This type of fat is believed to increase the risk of heart disease. In contrast, the participants in the placebo group gained an average of 1.5 pounds in November and December alone.

“Despite no differences between the CLA and placebo group with regards to calorie intake or physical activity throughout the study, the CLA group still managed to lose weight prior to the holiday season and didn’t gain any weight over the holidays,” said study author Andrea Buchholz, professor of applied nutrition at the University of Guelph in Canada.

The study was published in the International Journal of Obesity.

CLA is a form of naturally occurring polyunsaturated fat found in meat and dairy products. CLA supplements are available in health-food stores and pharmacies. While animal studies have suggested that CLA helps burn existing fat and impedes proliferation of new fat cells, previous research in humans has yielded inconsistent findings, CBC News reported.

Looking to make a change and lose some weight? I have reviewed the top diet on the internet and you can go and read over 200 comments people have made about why this diet has worked well for them, as well as some of the problems.

I found the following story at Sympatico-MSN site and thought it was interesting although there is not enough information to draw a conclusion. It seems to me that a gradual weight loss is best(HealthDay News) – The skeletal muscle of severely obese people is specially programmed to amass fat, researchers report.

The finding suggests the muscle has a metabolic “memory” of obesity, and it may explain why obese people have such a hard time losing weight, even when they cut calories.
The study in the October issue of Cell Metabolism also suggests that exercise may be able to override this programming and improve the ability of the obese to shed unwanted pounds.

Researchers found that the fat-building enzyme stearoyl-CoA desaturase-1 (SCD-1) is three times more abundant in the muscle of obese people than the muscle of lean people. This finding provides insight into an important link between obesity, diabetes and abnormal fat buildup in muscle, the researchers said.
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