Did you know that there are different types of body fat? The body has adipocytes (fat cells) that are white, beige, and brown in color. AS, depending on its color, fat benefits us or affects us negatively.
types of body fat
white body fat
White body fat is what we all know, that is, what accumulates. It acts as an energy reserve and its metabolic impact is responsible for all the pathogenesis associated with obesity.. Unfortunately, it is the most abundant type of fat in the human body and it is greater in obese subjects.
brown fat
This type of body fat is thermogenic, ie activates the metabolism to obtain energy in the form of heat. Indeed, its dark color is due to its high density of mitochondria (cell energy units).
Until a few years ago, this type of body fat was thought to be present only in infants to maintain an optimal temperature after its appearance in the external environment.
However, today it is known that, although to a lesser extent, It is also present in adults and is greater in thinner ones, according to study published in the journal “Current Opinion in Lipidology”.
In the newborn it is located in the interscapular region and can represent 5% of the total body weight. In adults it is found scattered among white adipocytes, mainly in the neck, supraclavicular region, periaortic tissue, paravertebral region and perirenal area.
beige body fat
The discovery of beige fat is the most recent. Regard white adipocytes that behave like brown by the action of certain stimuli that activate the secretion of irisin. When the stimulus is removed, the white adipocytes recover their original behavior.
However, this type of fat decreases with age, as indicated in a article published in the journal “Frontiers in Endocrinology”.
According to the last one, it becomes apparent which types of body fat are the healthiest. The goal would be to increase the number of brown fat cells and maximize the conversion of white fat to beige.
Stimuli that favor the browning of white fat
Cold (<20ºC) and physical exercise are the only two stimuli capable of activating brown fat and make White act like one momentarily. This would be fundamental in the management of obesity and its complications.
This is particularly important in cases of hyperplastic obesity because there is an increase in the number of adipocytes. At the moment, the different ways of dealing with overweight and obesity only allow you to reduce the size of the adipocytes and not your number.
Thus, people whose obesity was acquired in childhood (hyperplastic obesity) will always maintain a higher obesogenic tendency than those who became obese later (hypertrophic). Here, Since we can’t eliminate fat cells, it’s crucial to make them behave differently.
cold against obesity
Until now, exposure to cold is the most powerful and effective stimulus to activate brown fat and make white adipocytes behave like brown ones. However, there are still no known exposure strategies that are effective without being harmful to the subject.
Impact of exercise on body fat
The above constitutes further proof that the benefits of physical exercise go beyond the caloric expenditure required by its practice. We know that he is able to stimulate the brown tissue and make the white momentarily behave like him. Also, as we have developed in previous publications, it is capable of editing the file obesogenic epigenetics.
There are different types of fat
Science has proven that there are 3 different types of fat in the body. However, it is not yet known precisely how to stimulate the increase in fat stores considered healthy for health. More research is needed in this regard.
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