Research

Mixed

Using a single muscle biopsy with a long tracer incorporation time (approx. 3 hours) yields reliable myofibrillar protein synthesis rates comparable to the traditional two-biopsy method.

If you are measuring muscle protein synthesis using stable isotopes, you can safely use a single muscle biopsy instead of two, provided you extend the tracer incorporation time to approximately 3 hours. This reduces subject discomfort and risk without compromising the reliability of the results, as long as you use plasma protein for baseline enrichment.

GoodSupportsHIGH confidence
These data demonstrate that the single biopsy approach yields comparable rates of muscle protein synthesis, provided a longer incorporation time is utilized, to that seen with a traditional two biopsy approach.
Nicholas A. Burd et al. · Nutrition & Metabolism · 2011

Why this rating

Randomized controlled validation study with clear statistical comparison (P=0.3) between methods, though small sample size (n=8).

Source

Validation of a single biopsy approach and bolus protein feeding to determine myofibrillar protein synthesis in stable isotope tracer studies in humans

Nicholas A. Burd et al. · Nutrition & Metabolism · 2011

DOI 10.1186/1743-7075-8-15

rct · n=16Cited 65×
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DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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