Thanks for the paper

Protein does not stimulate insulin release in a meaningful way, it's a very minor imperceptible bump. While technically true that more protein means more insulin. It's almost nothing, and it's blown away by any amount of carbohydrates.

IP was a high protein powder preparation containing 34 g of protein, 2 g of fat and 6 g of carbohydrates (i.e. 75%, 12% and 13% of total energy content, respectively) per sachet. Protein sources for the IP were composed of a mixture of milk protein fractions and free amino acids (patent reference: US 20140287057 A1). CP was an isocaloric mixture containing only 7.3 g of protein, 7.6 g of fat and 24.5 g of carbohydrates designed to not alter the overall balance of a conventional diet (i.e. 15% protein, 35% fat, 50% carbohydrate).

The subjects were eating the same hypocaloric diet, but had a difference of 56g of protein per day, and 36g of carbohydrates per day. The diet was best effort at home diet, with a dietician checking via phone calls.

It is a interesting study, especially with the increase in visceral fat reduction, but it still (to me) leave open the possibility of carbohydrates being the main variable here. People are more satisfied with protein and cheat less at home. Thanks for the paper recommendation.

I'd love to see the same study repeated with a hypercaloric diet, and a cgm. I suspect the visceral fat wouldn't decrease due to the carbohydrate load. I've read a case report of someone doing hyperdiet caloric diets for comparison, and on a zero carb diet they did gain weight but their waist circumference went down, implying visceral fat reduction.

There has been some interesting work done on zero-carbohyrdate people and their gut micobiome and it's very different then the standard, but also very diverse. It could be a factor! But I still suspect insulin as the main culprit with visceral fat.