IGF-1: Fundamental for Muscle Growth
Several key growth factors and hormones control muscle development. Of these, testosterone and insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) are extremely important.
Testosterone & IGF-1 Stimulate Muscle Growth
Testosterone is a steroid hormone that triggers the reading of genes coding for proteins essential for muscle development. By mechanistic contrast, IGF-1 promotes the physical elaboration of these proteins once their genes have been read. Hence, the participation of both these myogenic (muscle generating) agents is needed for optimal muscle development.
Muscle Volumizing = Muscle Anabolism
It has been known for quite some time that cell swelling provokes a biosynthetic response. That is, giving cells an agent that makes them take up water from their surroundings (to the point where they actually inflate with water) also causes them to increase their production of new proteins as well as to retard the degradation of existing proteins – an overall anabolic response.
Most importantly for the purposes of this blog, creatine monohydrate is one of the most effective swelling agents that stimulates cell anabolism. In fact, the most widely accepted side effect attributed to creatine supplementation is a process known as muscle volumizing; muscles increasing in volume (size) because of creatine ingestion.
Insights Into Creatine Anabolics
Anabolism: The set of metabolic pathways that construct molecules from smaller units (Wikipedia).
Let me expand this rather abstract definition of anabolism to better suit our purposes.
With reference to muscle development, anabolism is the combined set of cellular and hormonal circumstances that cause muscle growth to out weigh muscle breakdown following exercise.
With reference to creatine supplementation, recent scientific studies have been revealing some very exciting ways that creatine supplementation helps boost cellular anabolism.
First, the mere physical presence of creatine within a muscle cell serves as an anabolic stimulus. Creatine monohydrate causes muscles to swell with water, which turns out to be an anabolic stimulus for cells.
