Turn Fat Into Muscle?! What 2 New Studies Say About Ketones and Vitamin D

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In this episode of The Optimal Protein Podcast, I take a deep dive into two exciting new studies that could reshape how we think about fat loss and body composition.

The first study investigates how a medically supervised ketogenic diet not only promotes fat loss but reverses biological aging by more than 6 years. And it’s not just the calorie restriction—the study found that elevated ketones, especially beta-hydroxybutyrate, played a key role in reducing epigenetic age and promoting longevity pathways.

The second study examines high-dose vitamin D supplementation and how it may direct surplus calories away from fat storage and toward muscle growth—via mechanisms involving myostatin and leptin signaling. While preclinical, the findings open up new conversations around vitamin D as a muscle-preserving, fat-loss–enhancing tool.

If you’re focused on losing fat, preserving muscle, and optimizing metabolic health, this episode is packed with cutting-edge insights.

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🔍 What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• How the very-low-calorie ketogenic diet (VLCKD) reversed biological aging in adults with obesity

• The role of ketonemia (beta-hydroxybutyrate) in slowing cellular aging

• Ketones as signaling molecules: antioxidant effects, insulin sensitivity, autophagy, and more

• The potential for endogenous ketones to promote longevity

• How high-dose vitamin D may reprogram calorie allocation—favoring muscle over fat

• The roles of myostatin suppression and leptin signaling in body recomposition

• Why optimizing vitamin D status could matter for muscle preservation and fat loss

• What this research means for your own diet, supplementation, and metabolic strategy

📚 Studies Referenced:

1. Epigenetic Aging Acceleration in Obesity Is Slowed Down by Nutritional Ketosis Following Very Low-Calorie Ketogenic Diet (VLCKD): A New Perspective to Reverse Biological Age

Published in Nutrients, March 2025

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