Table 3.

Summary of research findings and gaps in research comparing intermittent energy restriction/intermittent fasting to CER for weight control and metabolic health.

Outcome	Effects in People Who Are Obese or Overweight	Effects in People Who Are Normal Weights	Effects in Rodent Studies
Weight loss/prevention of weight gain	IER = CER for weight loss in six studies which were not powered to detect differences in weight. The study finding are suggestive but not conclusive of no difference between IER and CER weight [12,13,14,26,27,33]	No long term data	N/A
Proportion of body fat stored as visceral and subcutaneous fat	No data	No data	Mixed results: Reduced visceral and increased subcutaneous fat in female C57BL/6J mice [50]. No change in male C57BL/6J mice [51]. Increased visceral and decreased subcutaneous fat in 4 week old male Sprague Dawley rats [53] and LDL-receptor knockout mice [54].
Fat cell size	No data	No data	Reduced in male C57BL/6J mice [51]
Hepatic fat	No data	Modest increase after a single 24 h fast in men not women [46]	Mixed results: Deposition in IER > CER [53,54] IER = CER [87].
Intra myocellular triglycerides	No data	Modest increase after a single 48 hour fast in women but not men [45]	No data
Insulin sensitivity	Mixed results IER > CER (HOMA) [12,13] Reduced HbA1c IER = CER p > 0.05 [27,33]	Mixed results IER > CER [16] IER = CER [17]	Mixed results IER > CER total body and hepatic insulin sensitivity [73]. IER < CER peripheral insulin sensitivity [74] IER > CER hepatic insulin sensitivity [74]
Fat free mass	IER = CER [12,26]	No data	No data
Resting energy expenditure	IER = CER [26,28] IER > CER [18]	No comparison data	No data
Metabolic flexibility	No data	No data	IER > CER [77].

IER, intermittent energy restriction; CER, continuous energy restriction; LDL, low-density lipoprotein; N/A, not applicable.