MRI image of brown fat in the posterior neck (the location in teal blue outlined in pink). Credit: McMaster University
Research study might use brand-new treatments to treat weight problems.
A research study at McMaster University has actually discovered that brown adipose tissue (BAT) is less active in kids with weight problems compared to young boys with a regular body mass index (BMI).
Senior author Katherine Morrison said that BAT, likewise known as brown fat, helps the body burn regular fat and is triggered by cold, but her research group saw minimized BAT activity in the kids with weight problems in action to a cold stimulus.
The scientists of McMasters Centre for Metabolism, Obesity and Diabetes Research performed MRI scans to measure BAT activity in 26 young boys in between the ages of 8 and 10. They studied the BAT tissue in the neck before and after one hour of exposure to a cold match set at a temperature of 18 degrees Celsius. The patient sample included 13 boys with a regular BMI and the very same number again with obesity, in the very first study of its kind in kids.
The researchers of McMasters Centre for Metabolism, Obesity and Diabetes Research performed MRI scans to measure BAT activity in 26 boys between the ages of eight and 10. They studied the BAT tissue in the neck prior to and after one hour of direct exposure to a cold fit set at a temperature of 18 degrees Celsius. Investigating BAT activity holds out the hope of establishing a brand-new class of drugs that increase the amount of energy you burn.”
” The promise of this study is that if we can much better comprehend BAT and how to simulate or stimulate its impacts, it may provide us brand-new treatments to deal with weight problems,” said Morrison, a teacher in the universitys Department of Pediatrics and pediatrician at the McMaster Childrens Hospital.
” Beyond assisting families improve their nutrition, physical activity, and sleep, we have few treatments to help kids and teenagers with obesity. There are new medications that lower appetite utilized in some adolescents. Examining BAT activity holds out the hope of establishing a new class of drugs that increase the amount of energy you burn.”
Morrison said that it is still unknown whether a lack of BAT activity triggers obesity, or if the condition simply hinders brown fats ability to burn energy.
She stated that newborns have large quantities of BAT, however it steadily decreases through childhood, so that by adulthood it is primarily present just in the neck region. The factor for reducing brown fat levels in kids stays unknown.
Morrison said her group utilized MRI scans to determine BAT activity as it did not expose the kids to ionizing radiation, unlike CT or PET scans. This potential security danger has impeded research study in children until now.
Recommendation:” Impaired Cold Stimulated Supraclavicular Brown Adipose Tissue Activity in Young Boys with Obesity” by Basma A. Ahmed, Nina Varah, Frank J. Ong, Denis P. Blondin, Elizabeth Gunn, Norman B. Konyer, Nina P. Singh, Michael D. Noseworthy, Francois Haman, Andre C. Carpentier, Zubin Punthakee, Gregory R. Steinberg and Katherine M. Morrison, 16 March 2022, Diabetes.DOI: 10.2337/ db21-0799.
This study was funded by an internal grant from the Boris Family and external funding for the research study was provided by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.