About the Mifflin-St Jeor Equation and Its Researchers
The Mifflin-St Jeor equation was published in 1990 by a research team at the University of Nevada School of Medicine, led by M.D. Mifflin and S.T. St Jeor — which is where its name comes from.
Where does the equation come from?
The equation was introduced in a 1990 paper in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, titled "A new predictive equation for resting energy expenditure in healthy individuals." The research team — based in the Nutrition Education and Research Program at the University of Nevada School of Medicine in Reno — measured the resting energy expenditure of 498 healthy adults and used that data to build a formula that predicts resting calorie burn from weight, height, age and sex.
Why was a new equation needed?
The equation most widely used before it, the Harris-Benedict equation, dated back to 1919 and was built on a lean, early-20th-century sample (239 adults of both sexes) whose body composition differs from today's heavier population. In modern validation studies it tends to overestimate resting calorie burn in many adults. The Mifflin-St Jeor team set out to produce a more accurate predictor for today's population — and a 2005 systematic review later found it did exactly that, predicting measured resting metabolic rate more accurately than the older formulas. The full story of that comparison is on the equation explainer, or run your own numbers on the Mifflin-St Jeor calculator or the BMR calculator.
Why does it carry their names?
Scientific formulas are conventionally named after the researchers who publish them — as with the Harris-Benedict equation before it. "Mifflin-St Jeor" simply credits the two lead authors of the 1990 study.