Brown fat: smaller waists, same old health problems
It's not the brown fat. It's that entire cake you ate.
Americans have a love/hate relationship with fat. We hate it on our bodies, as the booming popularity of gym memberships, liposuction sessions and eating disorders can attest. But we love it in our food: 10 million donuts and 500 million Twinkies are gobbled up by Americans each year.
That love/hate is getting more complicated, with a spate of recent research that reveals a difference between white and brown fat on our calorie-burning potential. Experts once thought that humans didn’t have any brown fat tissue, the kind that burns up calories without expended effort. Now, they’re pretty sure we do – and some of us have more than others. Younger people seem to have more brown fat, and it’s also becoming apparent that certain genes are also involved.
Now that preliminary research is wrapping up, the race to whittle waistlines begins. Different approaches being explored include the surgical implantation of fat cells and drug-induced genetic manipulation.
Raise a toast (and down a Twinkie): science can soon proclaim victory against the War on Fat! But hold on a sec. Fitting into smaller jeans and still eating deep dish pizza, all because you’ve started popping brown fat pills, sounds pretty lovely. But does brown fat have anything to do with actually improving human health?
Brown fat tissue is prevalent in animals who are often exposed to cold weather, because it stimulates the production of heat energy. That’s got nothing to do with health. It’s an evolutionary adaptation that we Americans, with our comfy fireplaces and central air, don’t need. And some diabetes drugs, called glitazones, stimulate the growth of brown fat tissue in lab tests on isolated human cells – but not when used for their prescribed purpose (regulating blood sugar). Diet and exercise, on the other hand, are proven to help manage diabetic symptoms.
Research is ongoing, but the above facts suggest that brown fat tissue is unrelated to health benefits. Losing weight by eating better and exercising makes you healthier: it lowers blood pressure and cholesterol, improves blood sugar levels and strengthens your heart. Losing weight because your new brown fat deposits are torching calories? Mm. Not so much. Thin people with sedentary lifestyles and poor diets are more likely to kick the bucket early, compared to chunkier fit folks.
The brown fat brouhaha sounds like science peddling a) an easy cop-out to explain away America’s weight problem (“It’s not me, it’s my genetic predisposition to fewer brown fat deposits.”); b) a surgically-induced eating disorder. Eat your Twinkies, then get your fat implants – and skip the gym! And one scientist involved in the research certainly reinforces my suspicion:
A mere 50 grams of brown fat – well within the range of what some of us already have – could dissipate around 500 calories a day. “I exercise on an elliptical trainer and it’s pretty hard for me to burn up 500 calories,” says Ronald Kahn, head of obesity research at Harvard Medical School’s Joslin Diabetes Center. “If I could do it without working and do it every day, it would be pretty great.”
via The fat that makes you thin – health – 14 August 2009 – New Scientist.
First of all, if you can’t burn 500 calories on an elliptical trainer, you need an Extreme Self lesson in sweating ’til you puke. But more importantly, I’d like to see Harvard’s obesity experts touting the benefits of physical exercise, instead of pining for fat-infused inactivity.
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As we all know, it’s a love-hate relationship with pleasure (eating) versus pain (exercising). Eating garbage is fun and quick and easy and cheap, certainly in public and gulped while in motion, (where so many of us spend our workday) where the default choice can be to buy and eat a Twinkie or some other thing laden with fat/sugar/salt. It’s less amusing to eat an apple or peach (on the subway or bus or your car, dripping on or spraying yourself or others) or banana, although much healthier and fewer calories.
Going to the *&%$# gym and “sweating ’til you puke” just doesn’t sound like quite as appealing to, I’d guess, about 95% of Americans. I went for my 4-mile walk this week in 95 degree heat, in my ongoing battle to stay healthy and lose weight. Fun? Not as much as eating a Twinkie, or its equivalent.
I think the population divides, emotionally and physically, into hardcore jocks like you or me and the soft core who hate sweating, gyms, the tedium of gyms, the obnoxious crowds in many classes, etc…
I admit, I may be in a minority with my enjoyment of vomit-inducing exercise. I think it’s inherited.
I just wish the “default choice” for dining wasn’t a Twinkie or a donut. Food = fuel. Sure, sometimes indulgent or pleasurable or fun fuel. But still, that’s what it comes down to. And I think this brown fat enthusiasm is just another manifestation of that cultural yen to eat with abandon and not suffer the repercussions. But while brown fat might minimize the *weight* repercussions of poor lifestyle choices, I don’t think it’ll improve the more serious implications.
That walk sounds awesome. I’ve been all up on hot yoga lately. It’s puke-errific.
Katie, the problem with just trying to work out more to control weight is that an increase in activity usually produces an increase in appetite. You nailed it with the “food = fuel” equation, and when the body perceives a need for more fuel, everything starts to look absolutely yummy.
Oh, and where can I get my eye bleach?
In response to another comment. See in context »Eye bleach? As in: you do not like photos of large tummies?
As for working out = appetite. That’s fine with me. Totally fine. I just don’t equate exercise with weight control. I think if you’re active, and you eat good things, it’ll all work itself out. Maybe you won’t be skinny, but your body will be a healthy one.
In response to another comment. See in context »Is it Twinkie Time yet ? After an easy 15 kilometre run I am more inclined to a Tim Horton donut, but then I am Canadian.
Feeling good is the driver, how about a cheer for the endorphins and a donut or 2 or 3.
Mr. Drummond, thank you for your insight. And glad that your 10-year-old computer is able to load the site these days.
You said that “feeling good is the driver” – are you suggesting that we swap all this “let’s get skinny” research for workouts that will motivate Americans to lose weight the active way?
Katie, if it’s not too-too personal, what’s the appeal of exercising so hard you vomit, or might do so? I’ve been so active, on occasion, I’ve fallen asleep mid-sentence, but puking…can’t see the appeal. Do tell.
Of course not too personal!
I just love really, really challenging exertion. Going through total heart-pounding hell and living to revel in it, and radiate with endorphins for a solid 10 hours afterward.
But that’s the best “explanation” I’ve got. My dad is quite the athlete, so I suspect there’s a genetic predisposition to intense physical effort.
In response to another comment. See in context »“Going through total heart-pounding hell and living to revel in it,” now you’re speaking my language.
Also, you totally pwned your dad with that 10-year-old computer diss. Zing!
Katie, as someone who’s competed nationally, I certainly get the appeal of doing a sport hard and well. Like you, my Dad’s a jock — who got a mountain bike as one of his recent 80th birthday gifts — as are both of my brothers. I think having it in the family helps. We once did a squash round robin I thought might kill us all.
These days, I find work sufficiently aerobic as it is.