Brown tissue offers a fat target for obesity drugs

Developers have a new target to consider in the scientific fight against fat.

In three different studies published in the New England Journal of Medicine, scientists report that the adult body contains brown adipose tissue, which it uses to generate heat. Activating the tissue or finding a drug that makes more of it, would offer a new pathway to combat obesity. Most of the fat in adults is white adipose tissue, which is used to store energy, and a growing number of adults have far too much of it.

Using positron-emission tomography, the researchers were able to observe the brown tissue, which is activated naturally as the body grows cold.

"Taken together, these studies point to a potential 'natural' intervention to stimulate energy expenditure: turn down the heat and burn calories," wrote Francesco Celi, an endocrinologist at the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. 

- read the article in the Wall Street Journal

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