Adipose tissue, with fat droplets in green and blood vessels in red. Credit: The laboratory of Zoltan Arany, MD, PhD, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
A signaling pathway in fat cells may one day provide the key to better treatments for obesity, according to new research by the Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania. Ordinary white adipocytes, stuff themselves with fat molecules to store up energy, and their overloading leads to obesity and related conditions, including diabetes. Brown adipocytes, which are prevalent in children as “baby fat,” but much less so in adults, do virtually the opposite: they burn energy rapidly to generate heat, and thereby protect the body from cold as well as obesity and diabetes.
About 36% of American adults are conside...
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