Hot Fat Implants to Reduce Weight?

HOW HOT FAT MAKES AN APPEARANCE

In recent news, scientists at the University of Berkeley have developed a way to encourage the growth of hot fat (also known as “brown fat”) that aids in reducing weight and low blood sugar in mice subjects. The study is available to read online in the Diabetes journal.

In the University of Berkeley’s press release made available by the university, the hot fat implant was shown to produce the favorable results mentioned in the beginning, involving the use of the fat to help burn the calories. The implications of this study have some promising potential, according to one of the researchers of the study, Kevin Tharp, a student in the Department of Nutritional Sciences and Toxicology.

FURTHER ILLUMINATION ON THE RESEARCH

Before, what was known about brown fat was that it disappeared as one grew older, but can still be found in certain areas of the body in adults. According to him, the potential uses for the hot fat implant could be applied to a great deal of things such as being used for therapy.

In the mice tested on for the study, not only has the hot fat had a positive impact on the mice’s metabolism and health, but it also helps them produce heat. This is evident in a thermograph when viewing a place with no implant in the mice, and the opposite side of the mice where the hot fat implant does exist. The latter was shown to have a warmer temperature than the former.

HOW THE IMPLANT CAME TO BE

When a body is cold, a flip happens and more food is usually eaten. So to explore the hot fat research more, researchers toyed with the idea of promoting more growth of hot fat without the cold temperatures that would negate the effects of it.

Researchers took on the task of experimenting with stem cells in a soft 3D mesh of hydrogel and other things that would allow the stem cells to grow into fat instead of bone. After the conversion, they placed the new fat into the mice genetically engineered with an enzyme from fireflies that illuminate in order to track better. The now known increase in body temperature was recorded in the initial observations and in the accompanying high-fat diet gained only half as much weight as those without the implants did and had lower blood sugar.

With the promising results of the hot fat in mice, researchers are excited to see what the effects would be like on humans. But also how it can change the health concerns surrounding obesity and its related afflictions to something that is not so pressing or not so much a concern.


 

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