Protein bars are one of those sneaky "health" foods that tend to be packed with bad-for-you sweeteners and artificial ingredients, all of which take away from their purported weight-loss benefits. But scientists say they've just engineered a collagen-based protein bar that expands in the stomach, thereby helping you lose weight without having to cut calories.
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What is collagen?
To understand the basis of the research, it's important to first know the basic mechanisms of collagen, a protein made up of amino acids that your body gets from different high-protein and vitamin C-rich foods.
As Best Life previously explained, "Collagen is one of the most abundant proteins in the body and a key building block for skin, bones, muscles, tendons, and ligaments. You can think of it as the 'glue' that holds everything together, giving structure and strength to many of your tissues."
Though collagen is best known for creating healthy and youthful-looking hair and skin, it can also aid in weight loss.
"Glycine [one of the amino acids that make up collagen] forms muscle by converting glucose into energy. As a result, more lean muscle tissue gives your metabolism a natural boost," Amy Myers, MD, a renowned leader in functional medicine and gut health and a two-time New York Times bestselling author, told Best Life. "This is because muscle burns more calories than fat. Essentially, collagen benefits your body by turning it into a fat-burning machine—even when you’re at rest!"
You may hear of a lot of people taking collagen supplements, especially as they get older, since your body slows down its natural production of collagen as you age.
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How can collagen protein bars aid in weight loss?
Scientists from the University of Navarra in Paloma, Spain set out to observe the potential anti-obesity effects of bovine collagen (that from cows) that was " technologically treated to increase its water retention capacity... with the objective of inducing satiation," according to the study they recently published in the journal Nutrients.
"Many weight loss drugs are very expensive," said study co-author Paola Mogna-Peláez, PhD, in a press release. "We were interested in collagen because it is a protein that is cheap and easy to obtain and is not known to have any side-effects. It is also a compound that the public is familiar with."
"Crucially, collagen’s structure can be modified to allow it to absorb extra water, which leads to it growing in size," she explained. "We wanted to know if such a compound creates a feeling of fullness when it expands in the stomach, reducing appetite and leading to weight loss."
To test their theory, the researchers conducted a 12-week randomized controlled trial involving 64 participants aged 20-65, all of whom were overweight or obese. All participants were asked to follow a healthy Mediterranean diet, however, half were also given a collagen-enriched, chocolate-flavored protein bar and a glass of water to have every day before lunch and dinner.
Despite both groups consuming the same number of calories, the protein bar group exhibited the following results:
- Twice as much weight loss as the control group
- Decreased blood pressure
- Reduction in waist circumference
- Improved fatty liver levels
- Less hunger
- Evidence of increased muscle mass (which proves that their weight loss wasn't the result of reduced muscle mass)
"Our results indicate that, by swelling in the stomach, the collagen made the participants feel less hungry, which would have led to them eating less and so losing weight," concluded Mogna-Peláez. "Collagen may also have led to the participants building muscle and we know that muscle burns more calories than fat. It is also possible that collagen changes the make-up of bacteria in the gut, which may aid with weight loss and appetite control."
The researchers are now conducting additional studies to better understand how the protein bars, which are already on the market, affect the gut microbiome.
