PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Urlacher, Samuel S.
AU  - Snodgrass, J. Josh
AU  - Dugas, Lara R.
AU  - Sugiyama, Lawrence S.
AU  - Liebert, Melissa A.
AU  - Joyce, Cara J.
AU  - Pontzer, Herman
TI  - Constraint and trade-offs regulate energy expenditure during childhood
AID  - 10.1126/sciadv.aax1065
DP  - 2019 Dec 01
TA  - Science Advances
PG  - eaax1065
VI  - 5
IP  - 12
4099  - http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/12/eaax1065.short
4100  - http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/12/eaax1065.full
SO  - Sci Adv2019 Dec 01; 5
AB  - Children’s metabolic energy expenditure is central to evolutionary and epidemiological frameworks for understanding variation in human phenotype and health. Nonetheless, the impact of a physically active lifestyle and heavy burden of infectious disease on child metabolism remains unclear. Using energetic, activity, and biomarker measures, we show that Shuar forager-horticulturalist children of Amazonian Ecuador are ~25% more physically active and, in association with immune activity, have ~20% greater resting energy expenditure than children from industrial populations. Despite these differences, Shuar children’s total daily energy expenditure, measured using doubly labeled water, is indistinguishable from industrialized counterparts. Trade-offs in energy allocation between competing physiological tasks, within a constrained energy budget, appear to shape childhood phenotypic variation (e.g., patterns of growth). These trade-offs may contribute to the lifetime obesity and metabolic health disparities that emerge during rapid economic development.