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Today I came up with the following hypothesis whilst pondering stuff after coming back from the gym.

If I build more muscle, my body will have more places to store glucose.

Is this hypothesis correct?

That is to say, could building more muscle help to reduce blood sugar levels overall.

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    Great question-- but since we don't allow personal medical advice here, I'd eliminate the first part that's about you in particular, and leave the hypothesis part.
    – Nate
    Feb 8, 2018 at 19:26
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    @Nate sorry didn't realise... updated.
    – user7588
    Feb 8, 2018 at 19:50
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    There are three questions here. Which one do you want answered? Feb 8, 2018 at 22:47
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    @GrahamChiu updated.
    – user7588
    Feb 9, 2018 at 0:20
  • What exactly do you want to conclude from the answer then?
    – Jan
    Feb 9, 2018 at 8:45

1 Answer 1

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If you have more muscles, you will have more place to store glucose in them (in the form of glycogen), but what seems to be more important is the rate of glucose uptake by muscles, which increases with endurance training (running, swimming...) rather than with resistance training (body building).

The Role of Skeletal Muscle Glycogen Breakdown for Regulation of Insulin Sensitivity by Exercise

The glycogen content is higher in endurance trained subjects compared to untrained subjects and glycogen content increases in muscles after endurance training.

Also:

The reduction of skeletal muscle glycogen after exercise allows a healthy storage of carbohydrates after meals and prevents development of type 2 diabetes.

Exercise increases the glucose uptake by muscles by increasing insulin sensitivity:

Acutely, exercise improves insulin sensitivity in both healthy subjects and insulin resistant people. The improved insulin sensitivity after a single bout of exercise is short-lived but repeated bouts of endurance training improve insulin sensitivity beyond the acute effect of the last training session.

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  • Since glycogen is stored as intracellular granules, and muscle cell numbers don't increase, what governs the amount stored in the muscle cell? Feb 9, 2018 at 10:32
  • Exercise increases insulin sensitivity (I added another quote in my answer).
    – Jan
    Feb 9, 2018 at 10:56

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