Figure 1

Schematic representation of muscle protein metabolism in response to anabolic stimuli (exercise and/or amino acid ingestion) in young and elderly. We hypothesize the primary reason for muscle loss in the healthy older adults is the inability of elderly muscles to mount a robust 'youthful' protein synthetic response to anabolic stimuli above that seen in the basal-state. Shaded section indicates the difference in MPS between elderly and young in response to anabolic stimuli.