Burning Fat: White or Brown?

Researchers are claiming that there is a “new good fat“ that can help burn more calories. Infact, scientists have been working on this new good fat — also called the brown fat which will help speed up the metabolism process and hence aid weight loss. As against, white fat which stores excess energy, brown fat burns energy in order to produce heat. Brown fat is more prevalent among kids especially newborns that help in regulating body temperature. In adults, brown fat is considered to be little.

Researchers such as Bruce Spiegelman from Harvard University say that brown fat has much scope in controlling weight in the future. He further adds that if adults still had brown fat, they could be leaner and could resist obesity in the future.

In their latest research, Bruce and his team discovered what is called the “molecular switch” also known as PRDM16 that can actually create brown fat from immature cells and knock off PRDM16 to turn into muscles.

Bruce and his team showed that white and brown fat had totally different origins. The 2nd study conducted by Harvard’s Joslin Diabetes Center researchers showed a different trigger for brown fat. Yu-Hua Tseng and her team found that a protein called BMP-7 which promoted bone growth actually led to the growth of brown fat.

When studies were conducted on mice, it was found that mice without the BMP-7 protein had less brown fat and those which developed the protein had more brown fat and also reported greater energy expenditure.

Researchers are not very sure whether the same would be beneficial to humans. For instance, Bruce claims that it is easy to produce brown fat in mice but in humans the same could be quiet difficult and maybe more complicated. Though both studies have revealed the production of brown fat can help in burning greater energy, researchers don’t fight the light at the end of the tunnel as yet.

Moreover, the two studies on brown fat and its connection with burning more calories has raised two more important questions — the role of PRDM16 and BMP-7 in weight control or obesity. So till you finally what is it you’re burning — white or brown fat; just believe in burning as much as you eat by eating the right foods, exercising regularly and drinking healthy fluids, juices, etc to maintain a speedy metabolism and hence your desired weight.