In this video I'm going to be explaining how ketones are formed in the body in the least
scientific way possible.
Hey there Carb Dodgers, my name's Dr Dan Maggs.
I'm so glad you've landed on my channel.
I share new videos every Tuesday here where I help people live a longer, leaner, healthier
life through low carb nutrition.
If you're interested in losing weight or just becoming more healthy then please subscribe
to my channel and hit the bell if you want to be notified whenever I post a new video.
In this video we're going to learn how ketones are created in the body.
Now, this was my biochemistry textbook.
Look how thick that is and this is all about how ketones are formed in the body.
If you've done any searching online you probably realized that a lot of the videos out there
on this topic are really, really scientific but it's not necessary to go into that level
of detail if you're just trying to learn how to lose weight or be successful on a low carb,
ketogenic diet.
Now because ketones are a marker in the body that show us that we're burning fat it can
be really helpful if we're trying to lose weight to understand the conditions that we
need to create in our body in order to create ketones but what are ketones?
Ketones are a bi-product of burning fat and our body can use them as an alternative energy
source.
Really just think of them as an alternative energy source to carbohydrates and under the
right conditions fat can be released from our cells in greater than normal amounts and
be used by our body for energy.
Those two conditions that need to be satisfied are, firstly, low available glucose.
That will be low available glucose from our diets so we're consuming low levels of refined
sugar or starchy carbohydrates which ultimately break down to glucose.
We need to have run out of our short term bodily energy stores and those energy stores
are glycogen which is found in our muscle tissue and in our liver and that rapidly breaks
down between meals into glucose in order to supply us with short term energy.
Those all need to have run out.
The second condition is low insulin levels.
Now insulin is our fat storage hormone, basically it shunts glucose out of the blood into fat
cells in order for it to be stored as fat.
We can think of insulin really as a fat storage hormone.
If we're trying to lose fat, if we're trying to access our fat stores in order to use that
for energy we definitely want to have low insulin levels so low glucose levels, low
insulin levels, those are the two things we need to achieve.
How we going to do that?
Okay, number one, low carbohydrate diets, okay.
Particularly very low carbohydrate diets, what we would call a ketogenic diet which
means our body's creating lots of ketones.
So we're having a very low intake of glucose either from sugar or from starchy carbohydrates
in that kind of diet and it's going to take about two or three days to burn through those
short term energy stores in our bodies in order to get into a state of ketosis.
Now, it's going to vary for people but that's just as a rough guidance.
The second way of going about that would be fasting so just not eating and actually you're
going to burn through your short term energy stores probably in a day, maybe a day and
a half in that situation.
And the final way of producing those conditions in the body is via pretty intense exercise.
Take marathon running for example, you may have heard the term that marathon runners
use called hitting the wall.
Now, hitting the wall describes the sensation that people get at about mile 18 typically
and that corresponds to the body's glycogen stores running out.
So that's somebody who's probably loaded up on carbohydrates for the day or two before
the race, glycogen stores are full when they started out the race but they've run so far
that they've just burned through their glycogen stores.
These are people who are probably not used to running on ketones as their major source
of energy so when that happens it's like running into a wall.
Guys, I would really like to know if this is the kind of level that people want to learn
at on this channel.
I remember having to basically suffer through this book at medical school.
It used to send me to sleep on a fairly regular basis so if this is the kind of level that
works for people can you let me know by saying yes in the comments down below.
That'd be really good for me to get an idea of whether I'm doing the right kind of level
of teaching here on this channel.
Thank you.
So, under the conditions of low available glucose and low available insulin levels fat
can be really easily released from our cells.
Most cells in the body can use fat for energy but the brain can't so we have to have another
trick up our sleeves and specifically it's going to be our liver that really helps us
out here.
Basically the liver is awesome, it does an incredible job in our body of converting one
thing into another thing and specifically in this case it's going to turn fat into ketones.
The liver turns fat that's been released from the cells all over our body, been transported
via our blood stream into the liver into ketones.
That's the process known as ketogenesis.
Ketones levels will begin to rise in our blood and be transported around the body in order
for our cells to use them.
Now, most of the cells in the body can run on three different types of fuels.
The first one is glucose, the second one is fat and the third one is ketones.
Now our livers actually produce three different types of ketones but that really isn't that
important for this video, just know that the liver produces ketones.
Now, things like urine ketones, blood ketones and the ketones that we breath out, there's
different types of ketones so when we're actually looking at measuring those ketones we need
to know a little bit more about the different types of ketones but I've actually made a
separate video about that.
You can see that link down below or up in the top corner over here if you want to go
and check that video out.
So, that's basically it.
Ketones are produced by the body when conditions of low available glucose, low available insulin
levels are satisfied within the body and we can use fat from our cells and some of that
is turned into ketones in the liver which can be used by our brain.
Now when ketones are up and running and that process is really well established in our
bodies up to 70% of the energy needs of our brains comes from ketones and up to 50% of
the energy needed of our entire body come from burning ketones.
It's a really, really good alternative fuel source for the brain, and the whole body.
If you're just starting out on a low carb or ketogenic or keto diet then you're probably
going to want to download the sheet that I've made for you.
This is a sheet that explains all of the side effects you're going to expect to have in
the first few days or weeks of being on this kind of a diet.
Now, these side effects are to be expected but one of the problems I see is that so many
people give up on a low carb or ketogenic diet within the first few weeks because they
get these side effects.
Now, there really is no need for that.
Most of these side effects are to be expected, they're pretty minimal and they can really
easily be managed by the techniques that I outline in this document.
Go ahead, get that document and be successful.
Another thing that people find really, really helpful when making a lifestyle change like
switching to a ketogenic diet is support from other people so I've put together a Facebook
group where people can get together, build a community, share recipes in there.
I get in there and do live videos so please check out the link down below, have a look
at that group, please join, ask questions and get support from like minded people.
If you've liked this video please let me know by hitting the like button down below.
Please share it with your friends.
I'd really like it if you subscribed to the channel, remember I put new videos out every
Tuesday and please leave me a comment if you have this video helpful or you've got something
to add to the story.
Thank you for watching, I'll see you in the next video.