{"id":857463,"date":"2026-08-14T05:56:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-14T05:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/857463\/"},"modified":"2026-08-14T05:56:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-14T05:56:11","slug":"cutting-meat-and-dairy-for-just-a-few-weeks-can-alter-your-bodys-chemistry-sciencealert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/857463\/","title":{"rendered":"Cutting Meat And Dairy For Just a Few Weeks Can Alter Your Body’s Chemistry : ScienceAlert"},"content":{"rendered":"

We know that plant-based diets can be a good option for people looking to improve their health<\/a>, and a new study based on real-world dietary practices reveals fresh insights on why that might be the case.<\/p>\n

The study followed a group of 200 healthy people from the greater region of Thessaloniki, Greece, who abstain from meat, fish, dairy and eggs (essentially taking on a vegan diet) for a total of 180-200 days each year, as part of a religious practice connected to Orthodox Christianity<\/a>.<\/p>\n

These Orthodox Christians undertake this form of fasting on Wednesdays and Fridays every week, as well as across four longer periods through the year.<\/p>\n

That includes the 40 days preceding Christmas; 48 days preceding Easter (Lent); from 8 to 42 days during what is known as the Apostles’ Fast or the Fast of Peter and Paul; and for 15 days in August, for the Assumption of the Virgin Mary.<\/p>\n

\"StudyEven just a few weeks of cutting meat and dairy can make a big difference. (AegeanBlue\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

“This dietary regime is a real-world dietary pattern that is strongly motivated by religious belief, and is typically part of the culture of the family practicing individuals are born into,” explain<\/a> biostatistician Alexandros Simistiras and colleagues in a paper published in Nature Communications<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“Typically, during animal product restriction, in addition to a pronounced reduction of animal fat intake, periodically restricted individuals undergo restriction of protein (as a proportion of total energy intake). This is driven by abstinence from almost all sources of animal protein, and is not accompanied by a reduction in total energy intake.”<\/p>\n

As far as the scientists are concerned, this religious tradition creates a pretty ideal natural experiment for seeing how gene activity changes with diet.<\/p>\n

“The consistency of this dietary pattern and the predictability of the shift between omnivory and animal product restriction render this study comparable to a dietary intervention study,” Simistiras and team point out<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For a comparison group, the researchers enlisted 211 participants from the same area who do not observe these dietary restrictions.<\/p>\n

What they found were several important changes to the body’s chemistry \u2013 particularly certain levels of gene expression.<\/p>\n

The researchers already knew<\/a> the Orthodox tradition of switching to mainly plant-based foods led to “extensive metabolic reprogramming, with mostly beneficial effects on health, including \u2026altered abundance of key immunometabolic proteins, including potent metabolic hormone FGF21”.<\/p>\n

The new study revealed that participants practicing the meat-free fasts, who also had a certain gene variant that adjusts levels of the FGF21 protein, showed physiological signs the researchers think may be associated with a process known as adipose tissue beiging, which is when energy-storing white fat cells<\/a> act a lot more like the brown fat cells<\/a> that are readily burned to create heat<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“Although these findings should be interpreted with caution, it is plausible that diet-induced FGF21 levels may influence the process of adipose tissue beiging<\/a> in humans,” the authors write.<\/a><\/p>\n

A certain gene variant that is involved in regulating<\/a> a protein called LBR<\/a> (essential for the biosynthesis of cholesterol<\/a>) was also affected by giving up meat, in just a few weeks.<\/p>\n

That same gene variant also seemed to come with another effect linked to obesity.<\/p>\n

“This genotype-dependent upregulation of LBR may be a compensatory response to reduced dietary intake of cholesterol during animal product restriction compared to omnivory,” the authors note<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This hints at just how complicated the interplay of diet and genetics is when it comes to obesity.<\/p>\n

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“Carriers may be slightly more protected against obesity through the action of LBR, when practicing dietary restriction,” the authors explain<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“This finding may contribute to our understanding of why individuals who follow similar dietary patterns may exhibit differential risk for obesity<\/a> and provides broader insight into mechanisms shaping diet-dependent differences in disease risk.”<\/p>\n

Related: A Simple Diet Change Could Slash The Risk of Bowel Cancer in Men, Study Finds<\/a><\/p>\n

Ultimately, the study reveals many starting points for further research into the complex interplay of diet, genetics, and metabolic conditions.<\/p>\n

Even just a few weeks of cutting meat and dairy, it appears, can make a big difference.<\/p>\n

The research was published in Nature Communications<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This article was fact-checked by Fiona MacDonald<\/a> and edited by Peter Dockrill<\/a>. While we pride ourselves on our process, we are only human. If you spot a mistake, please let us know<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We know that plant-based diets can be a good option for people looking to improve their health, and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":857464,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[49,48,84,315,395],"class_list":["post-857463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nutrition","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-health","tag-msft-content","tag-nutrition"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/857463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=857463"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/857463\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/857464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=857463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=857463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=857463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}