Healthy volunteers of ideal weight (12 men and 12 women) were fasted for 6 days, and obese but otherwise healthy subjects (20 men, 28 women) for 6--28 days. In all groups studied a significant increase in urinary nitrogen loss from day 1 to day 3 of fasting was followed by a steady decrease. The early rise in urinary nitrogen excretion coincided with a rise in… Read More

Although there exists some indirect evidence that circulating ketone bodies might inhibit their own production rate, the direct demonstration of this homeostatic feed-back phenomenon is still lacking. The present work aims at demonstrating the operation of this control mechanism in human fasting ketosis. Six obese subjects, who fasted 2-23 days, were given a primed constant i.v. infusion of 3… Read More

Changes in blood levels of glucagon, insulin and glucose in response to infusions of alanine and glycine have been studied in postabsorptive and fasting obese human subjects. Four-to-five-fold elevations of baseline plasma alanine levels stimulated glucagon secretion significantly. Supraphysiological plasma levels of glycine had a small but insignificant stimulatory effect on glucagon… Read More

The renal tubular responsiveness to antidiuretic hormone was assessed in seven obese patients during starvation and feeding by an overnight dehydration test followed by exogenous vasopressin. All seven subjects showed a mean reduction of one-third in their maximum urinary osmolality on day 4 of starvation. Thes- data show that the renal tubule is partially insensitive to antidiuretic hormone… Read More

The protein-sparing capability of glucose was investigated in overweight subjects prior to and during the performance of prolonged therapeutic fasts. Blood (for hormones and substrates) and urine (for nitrogen and ketoacids) specimens were collected prior to, during, and subsequent to the performance of the following studies. Three subjects ingested, as their only source of calories, 37.5 g of… Read More

To evaluate the role of hyperketonemia in the hypoalaninemia and decreased protein catabolism of prolonged starvation, Na dl-beta-hydroxybutyrate was administered as a primed continuous 3-6-h infusion in nonobese subjects and in obese subjects in the postabsorptive state and after 3 days and 3-5 1/2 wk of starvation. An additional obese group received 12-h ketone infusions on 2 consecutive… Read More

Fasting hyperbilirubinemia (FHB) has previously been shown to be rapidly reversed by the ingestion of a mixed diet. This study examines the effect of carbohydrate, fat, amino acids, and noncaloric materials on FHB. After an initial fast of 15 to 39 hr, caloric and noncaloric materials were administered by mouth or vein to 13 subjects, and the total serum bilirubin (TSB) was… Read More