What is Brown Fat and How Can You Get More of It?
Everyone has some brown fat. Unlike regular
white fat, which stores calories, mitochondria-packed brown fat cells
burn energy and produce heat.
5 Fascinating Facts about Brown Fat
1. Brown Fat is Activated by the Cold
According to a 2014 study conducted by
National Institutes of Health Researchers, spending time in the cold
makes your brown fat more active, and could even cause you to grow new
brown-fat cells.
Brown fat “helps us to defend our body temperature in a comfortable
manner," said Barbara Cannon, a professor of physiology at the
Wenner-Grenn Institute in Stockholm and president of the Royal Swedish
Academy of Sciences.
2. It’s Found in Weird Spots
Brown fat is found in unpredictable locations in the human body.
Scientists know where brown fat can be found, but it’s not always there
in every single person. For example, it’s typically found in the neck
and shoulders.
In a recent study, brown fat was also found in the chests and down the
spines of a group of healthy young men.
3. You Have at Least Some Brown Fat
Everyone has some brown fat, even if it cannot be seen with a PET/CT
scan. Aaron Cypess, head of the Diabetes, Endocrinology and Obesity
Branch at the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney
Diseases in Maryland, believes that it’s possible to grow brown fat
cells in anybody.
4.It is hard to find
Brown fat can be hard to find and to study.
This is because brown and white fat cells are often mixed in together
in fat tissue. Therefore, finding the brown fat cells requires
performing CT scans to show where the fat is, combined with PET scans to
identify the most metabolically active cells.
5. Someday, You Might Be Able to Take a Pill to Activate Your Brown Fat
A drug that treats people with overactive bladders can boost brown fat
activity, according to findings that Cypess and his colleagues reported
in January 2015. The medication, called mirabegron, stimulates receptors
called beta 3 receptors, which cause smooth muscle to relax. These
receptors are also found on both brown and white fat cells.
5 ways to Increase Brown Fat to Help Burn More Calories
1. Don’t Starve or Stuff Yourself
We all rely on hunger-regulating neurons in the brain to notify us when
we have had enough to eat. But it turns out that these neurons have
another job to do: Researchers at the Yale School of Medicine found that
in mice, these neurons can actually encourage fat to turn brown.
The study, which was published in the journal Cell, found that eating
too few calories prevented white fat from turning brown, while eating
just enough to satisfy hunger turned white fat to brown. Other research
has shown that eating too much can do harm as well: Not only does
overconsumption increase white fat, but it also interferes with brown
fat’s ability to burn calories.
2. Eat an Apple
An apple a day might just keep the doctor and the fat away. Researchers
from the University of Iowa found that ursolic acid, found in apple
peels, boosted brown fat in mice – even when they were fed a high-fat
diet.
3. Exercise
3. Exercise
A study on animals published in the journal
Disease Models and Mechanisms found that working out triggers the
release of an enzyme called irisin that prompts white fat cells to
convert to brown. Newer research that was presented at the 2013 annual
meeting of the American Diabetes Association found that exercise can
prompt the browning of fat in men, with the benefits still increasing
after 3 months of training on an exercise bike.
4. Turn Down the Thermostat
One study, published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, looked at
twelve young men with lower-than-average amounts of active brown fat
who were asked to sit in a 63-degree Fahrenheit room for two hours a day
over a six week period. They burned an extra 108 calories in the cold
compared with normal indoor temperatures.
Even better, after six weeks their bodies were burning an extra 289
calories in the cold, prompting researchers to hypothesize that the
exposure to lower temperatures increased the activity of a gene that
converts white fat to brown.
5. Stimulate Your Body’s Melatonin Production
Not only does melatonin help regulate our sleep-wake cycle, but research
found that in rats, it increases the presence of beige fat, which is
similar to brown fat in its calorie-burning capabilities.
However, while you might be tempted to take a supplement, experts say
that it’s better to stimulate your body’s own natural production by
avoiding nighttime exposure to light from TVs, computers and other
screens, getting exposure to sunlight throughout the day, and loading up
on melatonin-rich foods such as tomatoes, almonds, cardamom, and
coriander.