Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Obesity Clue: Newly Identified Cells Make Fat enlarge
ScienceDaily ^ | Oct. 4, 2008 | NA

Posted on 10/05/2008 9:31:04 PM PDT by neverdem

To understand where fat comes from, you have to start with a skinny mouse. By using such a creature, and observing the growth of fat after injections of different kinds of immature cells, scientists at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Rockefeller University have discovered an important fat precursor cell that may in time explain how changes in the numbers of fat cells might increase and lead to obesity.

The finding could also have implications for understanding how fat cells affect conditions such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

"The identification of white adipocyte progenitor cells provides a means for identifying factors that regulate the proliferation and differentiation of fat cells," says senior author Jeffrey Friedman, who is the Marilyn M. Simpson Professor at Rockefeller and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator.

Obesity, a major public health problem in the United States and increasingly in much of the Western world, results, in part, from an increase in the mass and number of white fat cells. Because white fat cells are post-mitotic, meaning that they cannot divide, scientists have hypothesized that a population of fat precursor cells must exist in the fat depot in order to produce new fat cells. But identifying these fat precursor cells has been difficult.

With the assistance of researchers in Rockefeller's Flow Cytometry Resource Center, first author Matt Rodeheffer, a postdoctoral associate in Friedman's Laboratory of Molecular Genetics, used a cell sorting technique called fluorescence-activated cell sorting, or FACS, to search for cell populations that could produce fat in cell cultures and identified two such populations.

To determine if these cells could develop into fat cells in living animals, Rodeheffer injected these cell populations into the fat depots of a genetically engineered mouse, developed at NIH, called fatless, which lacks white fat and mimics a condition in...

(Excerpt) Read more at sciencedaily.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events; Testing
KEYWORDS: diabetes; genetics; health; medicine; obesity
The abstract is linked at the source.
1 posted on 10/05/2008 9:31:04 PM PDT by neverdem
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: neverdem
Newly Identified Cells Make Fat enlarge

They're called pizza cells.

2 posted on 10/05/2008 9:33:00 PM PDT by Darkwolf377 (I've got a bracelet, too. From Sergeant..... uuuuuuuhhhhhhh...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

Corrected Link
3 posted on 10/05/2008 9:33:50 PM PDT by rabscuttle385 ("Please sir, may I have another!")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: austinmark; FreedomCalls; IslandJeff; JRochelle; MarMema; Txsleuth; Newtoidaho; texas booster; ...
FReepmail me if you want on or off the diabetes ping list.

It's interesting that these mice without these fat progenitor cells are diabetic.

4 posted on 10/05/2008 9:38:35 PM PDT by neverdem (I'm praying for a Divine Intervention.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Darkwolf377

Are those anything like Krispy Kreme cells or malted milkshake cells?


5 posted on 10/05/2008 9:41:12 PM PDT by Blogger
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: neverdem
I was legislated into a life of obesity back in the 80's when the state of Ohio outlawed amphetemines.

(The nanny state bastards!)

6 posted on 10/05/2008 9:42:54 PM PDT by Slump Tester (What if I'm pregnant Teddy? Errr-ahh -Calm down Mary Jo, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: neverdem

bmflr


7 posted on 10/05/2008 9:43:37 PM PDT by Kevmo (McCain's learning from Palin how to win a national election. Palin's learning from him how to lose 1)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: rabscuttle385

Thanks for the correction.


8 posted on 10/05/2008 9:45:39 PM PDT by neverdem (I'm praying for a Divine Intervention.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: neverdem

“Newly Identified Cells Make Fat enlarge”

FOOD!

Now send me a couple of million to do the follow up study!


9 posted on 10/05/2008 9:46:36 PM PDT by dalereed
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: neverdem

That caught my eye as well. Hmm.


10 posted on 10/05/2008 10:08:38 PM PDT by fightinJAG (Fly the flag!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]


11 posted on 10/05/2008 10:11:05 PM PDT by CE2949BB (McCain/Palin 08)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Blogger

Mmmmm... cheeseburger cells...


12 posted on 10/05/2008 10:15:43 PM PDT by Darkwolf377 (I've got a bracelet, too. From Sergeant..... uuuuuuuhhhhhhh...)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: neverdem

bookmark


13 posted on 10/05/2008 10:46:46 PM PDT by GOP Poet
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: neverdem
It's interesting that these mice without these fat progenitor cells are diabetic. Was scratching my head ovee that as well. Different kinds of fat, with different purposes, but when you get out of proportion, they all look bad till articles like this! LOL

Please add me to your Diabetes Ping List.
14 posted on 10/06/2008 5:52:09 AM PDT by Titan Magroyne ("Drill now drill hard drill often and give old Gaia a cigarette afterwards she deserves it." HerrBlu)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson