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I have spoken before about how Atkins is only a short term solution but raising the protein in your diet is a great way to speed up your metabolism and accelerate weight loss.. A study here shows that this is in fact true.

There have been countless studies performed on the role of protein in the muscle growth process to try and determine exactly how much protein you should consume to build muscle mass. Recently, several studies have looked at the role that dietary protein plays in helping you lose fat, and more importantly, helping you keep it off!

One thing scientists have discovered is that eating lean protein foods is important for regulating body composition because it decreases your appetite.

In a 2003 study reported in the journal Current Opinion in Clinical Nutrition And Metabolic Care, protein was shown to be more satiating (made you feel fuller) than both carbohydrate and fat both in the short term and the long term.

Eating more lean protein foods has also been proven as an effective strategy to help you burn fat and keep it off because of something called, dietary thermogenesis (also known as the thermic effect of food).

In a study published in the British Journal of Nutrition in 2005 (93(2): 281-289), researchers followed a group of 113 over subjects after 4 weeks of a very low calorie diet, through a 6 month period of maintenance. The subjects were divided into a protein group or a control group. The protein group was simply given an extra 30 grams of protein per day on top of their usual diet.

The researchers found that during maintenance, the group with the higher protein intake was less likely to regain the lost weight, and any gain in the protein group was lean tissue and not fat. The results were attributed to higher thermic effect and a decrease in appetite.

After writing about how bad the sun is for you I have found this very balanced article by Robert Bazell at MSNBC that offers a great counter point to how good or bad the sun is for you. As always I believe that some good research is the most important way for anyone to decide weather they are doing the right thing or not as everyone has a bias as far as this subject goes.

The heresy: the sun can be healthy. The heretic: Dr. Michael Holick of Boston University, a seemingly gentle, but combative scientist-physician who studies the beneficial effects of Vitamin D, produced by our skin when exposed to the sun.

Report a story about Holick’s research and a reporter can expect to get — as I did — a rocket in the name of the president of the American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) alleging that the information endangers America’s health.

This battle is not about facts

It is more akin to arguments that erupt over advice that a drink or two of alcoholic beverages a day can help the heart. If we give those who are addicted an excuse, the argument goes, we’re handing them a ticket to excess.

To understand the debate, one must appreciate the AAD’s enormous success in recent years persuading Americans to either avoid the sun altogether or to slather on a lot of sun block if they can’t. Then, along comes Holick alleging that the campaign has gone overboard leaving millions of Americans Vitamin D deficient.

Not long ago medical wisdom held that Vitamin D deficiency only matters if severe enough to produce rickets, a horrible disintegration of the bones seen in children living in severe poverty. But research by Holick and others in recent years proves that Vitamin D plays a key role in avoiding osteoporosis, the bone thinning that often occurs with aging.

In addition, every cell and tissue in the body requires Vitamin D so a lack of it can increase the risk for conditions including heart disease, breast and prostate cancer and high blood pressure.

Many experts now say we need at least 1,000 international units a day of Vitamin D, and it is almost impossible to ingest that much from the typical American diet. Large doses of supplements or moderate sun exposure are the alternatives. One can argue the sun is the far more natural alternative.