14 DAY TRIAL // A couple of years ago, researchers documented a total of 2.1 billion overweight and obese people in the world. Judging by more recent studies and reports, it's safe to assume that this already impressive figure has since upped, and considerably so.
This explains why, in this day and age, an army of scientists are bending over backwards trying to come up with a way to safely and efficiently help folks bid their love handles their eternal farewell.
Brainiacs with Australia's Monash University count themselves among these researchers who are now doing their best to curb the global obesity rate. In a recent paper in the journal Cell, they argue that it might be that our own brain could help us lose weight.
How our brain could help us get in shape
Writing in the journal Cell, the Monash University specialists behind this investigation explain that the first thing to keep in mind is that the human brain, as well as the brain of other creatures, is designed in such a way that it can regulate body fat.
Hence, it makes perfect sense to turn it into our ally and put it to work helping us fit into that pair of skinny jeans or that tight shirt that's been hanging in our closet since the beginning of time. In a nutshell, the idea is to get the brain to instruct the body to burn fat.
How the brain regulates body fat
Study leader Tony Tiganis and fellow Monash University researchers say that, having carried out a series of experiments in laboratory conditions, they found that the brain regulates body fat with the help of two hormones known to the scientific community as leptin and insulin.
The former is an appetite suppressant that is produced by fat cells themselves and the latter is produced by the pancreas in response to an increase in the levels of glucose in our blood. The researchers say that, together, these hormones stimulate our body to burn fat.
“These hormones give the brain a comprehensive picture of the fatness of the body. Because leptin is produced by fat cells, it measures the level of existing fat reserves. Insulin provides a measure of future fat reserves because glucose levels rise when we eat,” says specialist Tony Tiganis, as cited by Medical Express.
More precisely, evidence indicates that, working together, these two hormones trigger the conversion of white fat, which simply hangs about our body and is essentially a biological storehouse for energy reserves, into brown fat, which our body more easily burns.
Getting the brain to promote weight loss
The problem is that leptin and insulin don't exactly run free in our body. On the contrary, their working agenda is regulated by specific enzymes known as phosphates. Apparently, these enzymes pull the plug on the hormones' activity after a while, and in doing so, they keep white fat from being converted.
By blocking the activity of these phosphates in our body, the leptin and the insulin could go on turning white fat into brown one unhindered. Since brown fat is more easily burned, this would ultimately translate into considerable weight loss.
As scientist Tony Tiganis put it, “Eventually, we think we may be able to help people lose weight by targeting these two enzymes. Turning white fat into brown fat is a very exciting new approach to developing weight loss agents.”