Brown adipose tissue activity controls triglyceride clearance

February, 2011

Background: Brown adipose tissue (BAT), or brown fat is a type of adipose tissue rich in mitochondria (hence its brownish colour) found in mammals. It has an important role in newborn and hibernating animals, as its function is to convert energy into heat to protect the body from cold. Brown fat is present in humans, although the amount of brown fat varies across individuals (depending on environmental temperatures, age, gender, BMI, glucose metabolism).
Research: Bartelt et al demonstrate that short-term exposure to cold activates brown fat in mice, leading to increased turnover of triglyceride rich lipoproteins. The authors state that the activation of brown fat is able to correct hyperlipidemia and improves the deleterious effects of obesity despite insulin resistance. In this research, the high speed of Nikon's A1 confocal resonant scanner (mounted on an Eclipse Ti inverted microscope) enabled intravital imaging of the vascular circulation and structure of interscapular brown fat in mice in realtime, without the need for multiphoton imaging (supplementary videos are available on the publisher's website). Brown fat is present in humans, suggesting a potential target for new anti-obesity therapies. A non invasive method of measuring brown fat activity is described, which might be suitable for assessing brown fat activity in man.

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