Many people strive hard to lose weight with vigorous exercises but have you ever thought about where exactly all the lost fats go? Does it turn to muscle? Or maybe it turns into energy? Perhaps it just vanishes into thin air! Which do you think it is?
According to The Conversation, many people (including health professionals!) do not know where the fat goes once you have burned it off.
Assistant scientist Ruben Meerman and Andrew Brown, professor and head of biotechnology and biomolecular sciences at University of New South Wales analysed the results of a survey where they asked the question, “When somebody loses weight, where does the fat go?” to 150 doctors, dietitians, and personal trainers.
Surprisingly, only three respondents managed to answer correctly. The most common answers were that the fat was converted to energy, changed to muscle or even expelled through the colon. However, all of these answers are actually wrong.
The correct answer is that fat will actually disappear into the air! No, we’re not joking. They wrote, “Fat is converted to carbon dioxide and water. You exhale the carbon dioxide and the water mixes into your circulation until it’s lost as urine or sweat.” Whoa!
“If you lose 10kg of fat, precisely 8.4kg comes out through your lungs and the remaining 1.6kg turns into water. In other words, nearly all the weight we lose is exhaled.” Turns out that almost everything we ingest will be exhaled through our lungs, even alcohol. But do drink responsibly!
The only thing that remains intact in your colon is dietary fibre. Everything else you eat or drink will be absorbed into your bloodstream or organs and then vaporised into the air. So, does this mean that the more we exhale, the more weight we’ll lose? Not quite!
If you inhale and exhale rapidly, this would only lead to hyperventilation and make you feel dizzy. The only way you can lose weight is by moving your muscles to produce more carbon dioxide, which is why exercising works to keep you in shape! Even simple activities like standing up and getting dressed doubles your metabolic rate so that you will exhale more carbon dioxide.
Keep on moving at the gym and breathe deeply!
Also read: Fatty Pork Announced as Top 10 Most Nutritious Food in the World