Even though drinking whey protein makes more building-block amino acids show up in the blood during extreme dieting, those amino acids don’t get the muscle to grow like they normally would.

Pro

Against

Evidence from Studies

Supporting (1)

Community contributions welcome

Protein synthesis signaling in skeletal muscle is refractory to whey protein ingestion during a severe energy deficit evoked by prolonged exercise and caloric restriction

Randomized Controlled Trial

Human

2019 Apr

Contradicting (0)

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No contradicting evidence found

Gold Standard Evidence Needed

According to GRADE and EBM methodology, here is what ideal scientific evidence would look like to definitively prove or disprove this specific claim, ordered from strongest to weakest evidence.

Source Study

Protein synthesis signaling in skeletal muscle is refractory to whey protein ingestion during a severe energy deficit evoked by prolonged exercise and caloric restriction

Score: 32

DOI: 10.1038/s41366-018-0174-2

Similar Assertions

Even when people eat whey protein during extreme dieting and lots of exercise, their muscles stop responding to it like they normally would — the protein doesn’t trigger the usual growth signals.

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Eating whey protein during extreme dieting might reduce the muscle’s fat-burning response to leptin, compared to eating sugar—but this isn’t proven yet.

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When rats exercised and then ate a small amount of whey protein hydrolysate, their muscles built protein faster than when they ate regular whey protein at the same dose.

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Even though whey protein made muscles build faster, it didn’t change the usual ‘on/off’ switches in muscle cells that are supposed to control growth—suggesting other mechanisms are at play.

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