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Energy flux: The key to boosting your metabolic rate and losing fat faster...

As a rule of thumb, the more muscle you have, the higher your basal metabolic rate. However, many people don't realize that muscle mass is not the only thing that affects your basal metabolic rate.

A little-known concept called energy flux also plays a vital role in determining how many calories you burn each day, and, as a result, the rate at which you lose weight.

Metabolic rate

As they age, people are generally less physically active. The result is that they burn fewer calories each day. Unless they eat less to compensate for this reduction in calorie expenditure, weight gain is the inevitable result.

It's also true that your basal metabolic rate — the number of calories your body burns each day just to stay alive — tends to drop as you age. According to conventional wisdom, this is because you lose a small amount of muscle each year.

However, studies show that your metabolic rate declines with age independently of muscle loss. In other words, young physically active men tend to have a higher metabolic rate than their older counterparts, even if they have the same amount of muscle.

The age-related decline in metabolic rate — even when muscle mass is taken into account — is down to...

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