The adaptive capacity of skeletal muscle underpins athletic performance, healthy ageing and metabolic health. Skeletal muscle exhibits remarkable plasticity, adapting to exercise through coordinated changes in gene expression, protein turnover, mitochondrial function, extracellular matrix remodelling, and metabolic regulation. While exercise is widely recognised as the primary stimulus initiating these adaptations, nutrition is increasingly understood more than just a source of metabolic substrate, but as an active regulator of the molecular processes that underpin adaptation. Rather than acting independently, exercise and nutrition converge on shared signalling pathways and related metabolic networks to influence the magnitude, specificity and temporal progression of skeletal muscle remodelling.

This presentation will examine the emerging concept of exercise and nutrition as complementary co-regulators of skeletal muscle adaptation. Drawing upon evidence from molecular physiology, human intervention studies and translational research, it will explore how exercise variables, nutrient availability, protein quality, energy status and nutritional timing interact to influence anabolic signalling, mitochondrial biogenesis and metabolic adaptation. The presentation will also highlight recent work investigating the role of dietary proteins and bioactive peptides in modulating post-exercise skeletal muscle responses, alongside emerging opportunities arising from multi-omics approaches that are transforming our understanding of the molecular mechanisms linking nutrition and exercise.

By reframing exercise and nutrition as integrated co-regulators rather than independent determinants of adaptation, this presentation will propose a framework in which optimal skeletal muscle adaptation is viewed as the product of coordinated mechanical and nutritional signalling, with new opportunities to optimise human performance, enhance healthy ageing and develop more precise, mechanism-based nutritional strategies to maximise the benefits of exercise across health and disease.