Although obesity is associated with higher risk of cardiometabolic disease, high-protein diets can reduce fatness but still promote cardiometabolic disease. Zhang et al. address this contradiction and show that high-protein diets, and subsequently higher blood leucine levels, promote mTORC1 activation in macrophages in humans and mice, and that an increase in dietary leucine raises the risk of atherosclerosis in a mouse model.
- Adam J. Rose
- Patricia M. Rusu
