[neverdem]

A PGC1-α-dependent myokine that drives brown-fat-like development of white fat and thermogenesis

[Mr. K]

dammit...

when are they going to discover something that makes me thin without having to exercise

[RoosterRedux]

I’ll take a gallon of brown fat please...some of that there beef jerky.

[Batman11]

“Brown Fat, Triggered by Cold or Exercise, May Yield a Key to Weight Control”

Not another Moo-chelle thread!

[Gator113]

So as I see it, if I stay with Chocolate ice-cream (brown fat), I’ll win at this. ;>)

[avacado]

"May Yield a Key to Weight Control"

Errrr... don't eat more calories than you burn. That's pretty simple, don't-cha thunk!

[Veggie Todd]

Brown fat? Where’s the little kid that says, “That’s racist!!!”

[martin_fierro]

Brown Fat, Triggered by Cold or Exercise, May Yield a Key to Weight Control

He may be useful after all.

[netmilsmom]

bttt

[JustaDumbBlonde]

I knew all of this 20 years ago.

[RegulatorCountry]

Brown fat is fat that burns calories? Sounds to me as if brown fat is fatbeing burnt for calories. Big difference there, and one that comports with the layman understanding with the latter, but an interesting headline and potential grant money generated by the former.

[neverdem]

Brown adipose tissue oxidative metabolism contributes to energy expenditure during acute cold exposure in humans FReebie

Yes, even human brown fat is on fire!

FReepmail me if you want on or off the diabetes ping list. Comment# 1 links an abstract too.

[grey_whiskers]

Like, *PING*, dudes and dude-ettes.

Thanks, neverdem.

[aruanan]

Mice given irisin lost a few grams in the first 10 days after treatment, the study shows, and certain genes involved in powering the cell were turned on. Irisin also appeared to reduce the damage done by a high-fat diet, protecting mice against diet-induced obesity and diabetes, according to the paper, whose first author is Pontus Boström.

Here's a scenario: a lab mouse weighs about 20 grams. We'll take "a few grams" to be at least 3 grams. Over the course of 10 days, the mouse lost 15 percent of its weight, replaced by a smaller amount of brown fat that is so metabolically active in a futile cycle that it was able to burn up 15% of the mouse's weight in body fat. So for a 200 pound guy, this would be equivalent to 30 pounds of fat. At 3500 kilocalories per pound, that's 105,000 kilocalories, or 10,500 kilocalories/day.

Unless someone finds a way to up or down-regulate the futile cycle in these brown fat cells, they will continue to metabolize fat at that rate. Given that the majority of the body's metabolic energy for basal and resting metabolism (including that of skeletal muscles) comes from fat, those brown fat cells will be competing for dietary fat once stored body fat is depleted. So in order to have enough fat to fuel BMR and RMR, the guy would have to consume his normal amount of fat in about a 2,000 kilocalorie diet (and a lot more if he's physically very active) plus another 10,500 kilocalories of fat to fuel the futile cycle of the brown fat cells, lest they rob him of the fat needed to maintain basic life function.

This would mean that his energy costs (food) would increase by over 500% (10,500/2,000= 5.25). Depending on how many people got this as a treatment for obesity (say half the population, since about half the population is supposed to be "obese"), the nation's food industry, including farming, would have to be geared up incredibly to meet the demand.

This would have an impact on use of electricity and fuel to process, store, transport, and sell all that food. It would also have an impact on someone's food budget by increasing it more than fivefold for each brown fattie.

The increased metabolism of these brown fat cells is dissipated as heat. So this would have an impact on clothing (you'd need much less of it), on winter heating bills (it would be less since you'd feel a lot warmer since keeping the individual warm without shivering is the function of brown fat in small mammals--unless you had a mixed family in which you'd probably have to have separate, much cooler rooms for the brown fatties), in the summer, though, you'd have to have much higher cooling bills.

I'm sure there would be protest groups decrying the horrible waste involved in a 500% increase in food for a certain number of individuals only for the purpose of getting rid of some fat when people elsewhere in the world are starving.

And all for what? Just to burn stored energy in a futile cycle to produce heat so that people who already consume more than their bodies need can look like someone who does not by burning five times the amount of food energy.

[aruanan]

The brown fat also kept its subjects warm. The more brown fat a man had, the colder he could get before he started to shiver.

Imprecise. It should read, "The more brown fat a man had, the colder the temperature he could experience before he started to shiver" since the uncoupling mechanism in the mitochondria in brown fat results in the production of heat rather than oxidative phosphorylation.

[webstersII]

Michael Phelps, the Olympic swimmer, ate approx 11,000 calories per day when he was training.

I saw an analysis that showed even at maximal rates of training he couldn’t possibly burn anywhere near that many calories.

But when you factor in that he was losing body heat by staying in a pool for many hours a day, the caloric intake makes alot more sense.