How brown adipose tissue reacts to a carbohydrate-rich meal

How brown adipose tissue reacts to a carbohydrate-rich meal

Brown fat consumes energy, which is the reason that it could be important for preventing obesity and diabetes. Working together with an international team, researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) were able to demonstrate that food also increases the thermogenesis of brown fat, and not just cold, as previously assumed. Brown adipose tissue in humans has been the subject of numerous studies, as it has the exact opposite function of white adipose tissue, which stores energy in the form of storage fats called triacylglycerides. Specifically, brown fat burns the energy of the triacylglycerides (thermogenesis). However, the activity of this physiologically highly favorable adipose tissue changes over time: It decreases with age, just as it does in obese individuals and diabetics. Hence, ways to heat up thermogenesis in brown fat are being sought which can be used to prevent obesity and diabetes. To date, only one option has been acknowledged in this context: Cold-induced thermogenesis. "Studies showed that participants who spent hours in the cold chamber daily not only experienced an increase in the heat output of brown fat in the cold as they got used to the lower temperatures, but also an improvement in the control of blood sugar via insulin," reports Professor Martin Klingenspor, head of the Chair for Molecular Nutritional Medicine at the Else Kröner-Fresenius Center at TU Munich.