Research

Hormonal

Aging is associated with an attenuated rise in muscle protein synthesis rate following the ingestion of dietary protein, a phenomenon termed anabolic inflexibility.

As you age, your muscles become less sensitive to the muscle-building signal from protein. This doesn't mean protein is useless, but it means you likely need to consume more protein per meal to get the same muscle-building effect you got when you were younger. Focus on ensuring adequate protein intake at each meal rather than just total daily volume.

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The present study demonstrates that an advanced age is associated with a blunted muscle protein synthetic response to protein ingestion... We conclude that the development of anabolic inflexibility contributes to the loss of muscle mass with aging.
Benjamin T. Wall et al. · PLoS ONE · 2015

Why this rating

Large cohort retrospective cross-sectional study using stable isotope methodologies, though not a randomized intervention trial.

Source

Aging Is Accompanied by a Blunted Muscle Protein Synthetic Response to Protein Ingestion

Benjamin T. Wall et al. · PLoS ONE · 2015

DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0140903

cross_sectional · n=106Cited 336×
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DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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