I have been following a neuroscientist on tiktok who offers a lot of advice about intermittent fasting.
He says that fat and fiber does not switch the body out of autophagy. Acacia powder is a soluble fiber and can be found at many health food stores. I take two tablespoons in half a cup of water and eat half a stick of celery (which is an INsoluble fiber).
This combination of soluble and insoluble fiber does a great job of making me feel full, and (according to this neuroscientist guy) does not interrupt the autophagus function that benefits us while intermittent fasting.
Sometimes I put the acacia powder, half a tablespoon of butter and half tablespoon of MCT oil in my coffee in the morning. Blended with an immersion blender it comes out creamy and frothy - with a little bit of cinnamon or cacao powder, I remain in autophagy and am still able to enjoy a luscious coffee.
I started doing this on the advice of this neuroscientist guy. Does anyone have any insight as to whether or not it’s true? Am I kidding myself?
Autophagy has not been studied as much as it should be, so it’s hard to make sweeping generalizations about everyone.
“A neuroscientist on tiktok” isn’t very authoritative, though, and they should provide a citation in any case, or expect to be taken with a grain of salt, to put it nicely.
I suspect that this is an assertion of opinion, based on the assumption that autophagy will occur in the absence of dietary protein to scavenge necessary amino acids from unneeded cells. But autophagy happens in many different pathways and and is governed by complex biochemical signaling so, as with any biology, armchair theories are worth nothing without rigorous, reproduced studies validating them.
In short, I doubt it.