Let’s say I drank an equivalent of 10lbs of soda, like 30,000 calories in the course of a day or two. Assuming I don’t die from consumption, how long would it take for my body to appear different?
In: Biology
You’re mixing up two different things. One is speed, the other is capacity.
After food is digested, glucose is released into the bloodstream. In response, the pancreas secretes insulin, which directs the muscle and fat cells to take in glucose. Cells obtain energy from glucose and any glucose not utilised (through activity) will get converted into fat for long-term storage. This happens pretty much immediately (maybe within minutes?).
So, in theory, those calories would show up as fat the same day. But….
The example you’ve chosen is not a good one because you’re now bringing in the aspect of how much glucose your body can convert to fat in a given time frame. Approximately 3,500 calories is 1 lb of fat. So, if you drank 30,000 calories in a day or two, that’s 8.5 lbs (or 3.9 kg) of fat! I don’t know what the body’s daily limit (purely chemical capacity to carry out the conversion) is but I’m sure it’s a LOT less than that. So what will actually happen is that the vast majority of those calories will get excreted through urine and poop.
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