Summary: Battling Obesity: It’s Time to Fight Fat with Fat Episode 44 by Lisa Willemse (Click here to directly access the MP3) (Access the full text transcript) Brown fat may become the newest weapon in the war against obesity. Unlike white fat, which stores excess energy, brown fat is highly metabolic, meaning it burns energy and therefore helps to regulate weight. New research has found that the same stem cells that produce muscle also produce brown fat and that a particular switch (namely a gene regulator known as microRNA-133) is responsible for telling the stem cells which type of cell to become. Listen to the podcast to learn what happened when the researchers flipped the switch to produce more brown fat and what that might mean for human health. For more information: H. Yin et al. (2013). MicroRNA-133 Controls Brown Adipose Determination in Skeletal Muscle Satellite Cells by Targeting Prdm16. Cell Metabolism17(2): 210-224. Gaining ground on losing pounds: How a little more fat might help combat the obesity crisis by Holly Wobma on Signals Blog Trigger Turns Muscle Stem Cells Into Brown Fat: Discovery Identifies Potential Obesity Treatment on Science Daily Lisa Willemse is a science communicator with an interest in the science found in our everyday lives. She has worked as a journalist, photographer and was once encouraged to take a job in sales (she lasted one day). She is an alumni of the Banff Science Communications Program and currently works for the Stem Cell Network in Ottawa.
