Skip to main content
. 2014 Aug 18;55(2):227–241. doi: 10.1080/10408398.2011.651177

Table 1 . Some of the more relevant differences in human metabolism associated to sex.

Female vs. male References
Higher postprandial response associated to visceral fat (Kuk et al., 2005)
Lower basal fat oxidation (Toth et al., 1998); (Nagy et al., 1996)
Lower epinephrine and norepinephrine during exercise (Horton et al., 1998)
Higher proportion of energy expended from fat during exercise (Horton et al., 1998)
Lower catecholamine mediated free fatty acid release in lower estimates (Guo et al., 1997)
Higher postprandial fat storage in subcutaneous adipose tissue (Romanski et al., 2000)
Higher blood flow and fat storage in lower body depots (Nguyen et al., 1996)
Lower chylomicron uptake in splancnic bed and hyperexpression of fatty acid transporter (Binnert et al., 2000)
Higher utilization of fat and lower utilization of carbohydrates during exercise (Carter et al., 2001)
Lower reactive nervous system, cardiovascular response, and carbohydrate oxidation during exercise (Davis et al., 2000)
Higher lipolitic and ketogenic response (Davis et al., 2000)
Lower fasting glucose levels and higher postload glucose (Poehlman et al., 1993)
Higher glucose uptake in specific sex organs a result of sex hormones regulation of the expression of specific glucose transporters (Glut-1), IGF-1, and EGF (Hart et al., 1998)
Lower large rental amino acids plasma concentration (Caballero et al., 1991)
Higher expression Na-coupled neutral amino acid transporter (Shennan et al., 2003; Shennan et al., 2004)
Higher protein turnover (Luiking et al., 2004)