How To Activate the Little Known Enzyme That Promotes Weight Loss and Longevity

DR LORI SHEMEK, PHD, CNC, CLC

BEST SELLING AUTHOR, SPEAKER, WEIGHT LOSS EXPERT, & RADIO SHOW HOST

Copyright by Lori Shemek

DR LORI SHEMEK, Ph.D., CNC, CLC is well known as a pioneer in creating global awareness of low-level inflammation and how it is the underlying cause of most illness, disease, faster aging, and weight gain. She has been sending out the message about inflammation long before it was a buzzword.

Dr. Lori has uncovered the pathway to the core cause of weight: inflamed fat cells that not only promote unwanted excess weight gain and belly fat but poor health as well.

Lori Shemek is a Nutrition and Weight Loss Expert, a best-selling author, and specializes in weight loss resistance. She has helped many people to once and for all.. lose weight and feel better fast. She shows people how to spot sneaky foods that create weight gain, kick sugar addiction to the curb, and shift from eating the wrong foods to the exact foods that burn fat.

Dr. Shemek is an award-winning, bestselling author of How To Fight FATflammation!; The Ketogenic Key; Beginner’s Guide to Intermittent Fasting and Fire-Up Your Fat Burn! She is a leading health and weight loss expert and also known as “The Inflammation Terminator.” She has made it her mission to help clients lose weight and educate the public on the toxic effects of certain foods and lifestyle choices and how they create inflammation in the body resulting in weight gain. She is a leading authority on inflammation and its role in weight loss, preventing disease, and optimizing health.

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New research is showing that a tiny enzyme within our cells promotes big results when activated in weight loss, optimal health, and longevity success. This enzyme, AMPK (Adenosine Monophosphate-Activated Protein Kinase) is found inside every cell in the body and serves as your body’s “master regulating switch” – our master metabolic molecule that influences how cells process energy. Overall, this enzyme plays a major role in determining our body fat composition.

When our cells lose energy, the cell degrades and so does our health. AMPK determines body fat composition, optimal health, and how long you’ll live. When AMPK is activated, cells do not make or store fat, burning up only stored fat. Our cells are less toxic, healthier, and live longer when AMPK gets reactivated. When the garbage can (our cell) is emptied of junk, optimal health, longevity, and weight loss can occur.

Why We Need AMPK To Make Us Leaner and Healthier

AMPK is crucial to our health by promoting insulin sensitivity– perhaps the greatest marker for optimal health. This enzyme also increases the production of our mitochondria – little organs in every cell that turn oxygen and food into energy. Our ‘Mighty Mitochondria’ is crucial to our optimal health and longevity. These mitochondria are the powerhouses within each cell in our body and when we lose them or they lose their ability to power up, we age. Our mitochondria are one of, if not the most important component of your cells. They supply over 90 percent of your body’s energy needs by converting the food you eat and the air you breathe into usable energy.

The SIRT1enzyme is boosted and required by AMPK as well. Until only recently has it become apparent that they have similar effects on cellular metabolism, inflammation, and mitochondrial function – they work hand-in-hand. The SIRT1 molecule has the very important role of silencing the genes that promote poor health effects and boost resilience to stress, promotion of mitochondrial function, protection from heart disease and cancer, as well as a reduction of inflammation.

Why AMPK Levels Declines

Excess food intake, poor nutrition, and the resulting excess of cellular metabolic debris within our cells promote inflammation and impair our longevity genes. When there is too much of an energy onslaught to our cells, AMPK activity diminishes and so does our health. This can result in weight gain, degenerative conditions, diabetes, and a shortened

life. AMPK is the controller, the link between metabolic disease, inflammation, and longevity. This AMPK control tells our cells when to create, store or release fat for energy. Without this crucial vital enzyme, we are at risk for weight gain, faster aging, and poor health.

Signs of AMPK Deficiency

Difficulty Losing Weight

Increased Belly Fat

Elevated Blood Glucose

Insulin Resistance

High Total Cholesterol and Triglyceride Levels

Decrease in Mitochondrial Function

How To Activate AMPK

When you begin to activate AMPK to healthful levels, inflammatory belly fat diminishes, due to increased fat burning that is being utilized for energy as opposed to being stored as fat only – promoting even further inflammation within the fat cell. Certain dietary strategies and food components greatly influence AMPK activity.

Natural Nutrients That Activate AMPK.

Resveratrol – This antioxidant activates Sirt1 but AMPK activates it more directly. Alpha Lipoic Acid – can activate AMPK in tissues, particularly muscle tissue. Additionally, this beneficial nutrient can also help reduce food intake through the suppression of AMPK in the hypothalamus. EGCG plant phytochemical from green tea. Curcumin the active component in the spice turmeric. Fish Oil – the EPA and DHA in fish oil activate AMPK. Quercetin – found in many plants including fruits, vegetables, and grains, increases AMPK in fat, muscle, and liver.

Dietary Fiber.

Fiber is a key player in activating AMPK. A special form of soluble fiber called glucomannan that is many times more effective than any other fiber in improving insulin sensitivity and activating AMPK. I write more about glucomannan in my book ‘How To Fight FATflammation!’ Other excellent sources of water-soluble, viscous fiber are beans, oat bran, nuts, seeds, psyllium seed husks, pears, apples, and vegetables. Calorie Restriction (CR). Dietary restrictions such as fasting of any type, can effectively increase AMPK, improve cardiac risk factors, protect against cancer, improve insulin sensitivity and longevity.

Exercise.

AMPK is stimulated by muscle contraction. Most notably and well researched, High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) is powerfully effective in activating AMPK. This is simply 8 brief bouts of, for example, 30 seconds all-out intervals with 90 second slow down to a moderate pace. There are many varieties of HIIT and all are short and excellent for promoting weight loss and optimized health.

The Drug Metformin.

Metformin is a drug widely used to treat those with type 2 diabetes and has a powerful effect on activating AMPK and increasing insulin sensitivity. Alternatively, the natural supplement Berberineworks as effectively as Metformin in activating AMPK.

Eating a healthful diet and exercising the right way, will help to promote weight loss, optimal health, and longevity. ~Dr. Lori Shiiemek

References

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ PubMed/25723157 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ PubMed/27456392 Habegger KM, Hoffman NJ, Ridenour CM, Brozinick JT, Elmendorf JS. AMPK enhances insulin-stimulated GLUT4 regulation via lowering membrane cholesterol. Endocrinology.2012 May;153(5):2130-41. Hawley SA, Gadalla AE, Olsen GS, Hardie DG. The antidiabetic drug metformin activates the AMP-activated protein kinase cascade via an adenine nucleotide-independent mechanism. Diabetes. 2002 Liu B, Zhou Z. Activation of SIRT1 by resveratrol requires lamin A. Aging (Albany NY). 2013 Feb;5(2):94-5 Yu W, Zhou HF, Lin RB, Fu YC, Wang W. Short-term calorie restriction activates SIRT1 4 and 7 in cardiomyocytes in vivo and in vitro. Mol Med Rep. 2014 Apr;9(4):1218-24. Winder WW, Hardie DG. AMP-activated protein kinase, a metabolic master switch: possible roles in type 2 diabetes. Am J Physiol. 1999 Jul;277(1 Pt 1):E1-10 Friedrichsen M, Mortensen B, Pehmøller C, Birk JB, Wojtaszewski JF. Exercise-induced AMPK activity in skeletal muscle: role in glucose uptake and insulin sensitivity. Mol Cell Endocrinol. 2013 Feb https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/ PMC2853213/ ©2018 DLS HealthWorks, LLC. Lori Shemek, PhD health expert and weight loss expert. Author of How To Fight FATflammation!and the best-selling author of ‘Fire-Up Your Fat Burn!’