It’s easy to say fat. But we must never forget that the body’s adipose tissue Humans have different metabolic and functional characteristics, also based on their colour. If “white” fat, when it accumulates, can be associated with a greater risk of inflammation and metabolic problems, as well as weight gain, the brown fat it could hide protective activities.
To reiterate this once again, focusing attention on regular physical activity as an element that favors its activation in a positive vicious circle which also leads to increased performance, is a research published in Agingconducted by experts from the Department of Cell Biology and Molecular Medicine at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School. Scientists point out, among other things, how the presence of brown fat could become protective not only against obesity and the difficulty in carrying out regular physical activity, but also in terms of prevention of diabetes, cardiovascular diseases and other degenerative diseases. In short, there is enough to try to understand what the differences are in the fat cells in our body and to make the most of their positive aspects, instead reducing risks linked to the accumulation of white fat, especially in some areas such as the abdomen.
White and brown, what are the differences?
Fat cells are of two types: the white ones, which represent the vast majority of the fat present in the body, and the brown ones. The latter retain the fat molecules within them in the form of small droplets independent of each other, and therefore more easily eliminated compared to the “large” and single drop of lipids that forms in white cells. Not only that. Brown adipose tissue would have a greater ability to control body weight because its primary task is the production of heat. The lack of brown cells and their replacement with white adipose tissue could be implicated in the genesis of obesity. In fact, brown cells ensure a high energy consumption, especially after having consumed foods very rich in lipids, and therefore very caloric, almost as if they were a sort of internal weight “regulator”. In the sense that the more you eat, the more energy is produced in order to maintain the body’s metabolic balance normal. The white cells, which progressively and autonomously replace the brown ones as the years pass because the former do not have to perform any heat “production” function in our environmental conditions, are instead real “reservoirs” of fat. Fat that accumulates and is “administered” to the body continuously, regardless of whether you eat it or not. For this reason it is thought that these cells were useful as energy “stores” in phases in which food is not available. However, brown cells tend to consume excess energy, when obviously one does not overdo it excessively with nutrition, while white cells retain most of the lipids that come from foods, if one does not make physical efforts that justify the need to the body to “draw” on these reserves.
Where the white and brown cells are distributed
In addition to being metabolically different, the two cell types also have a different distribution in the organism. In fact, normally subcutaneous fat is represented almost exclusively by white cells, while that found inside the body contains numerous brown cells. At least this happens at the start, normally. But yesand we overdo it with nutritionin particular with lipids, without there being a need for high heat production because the climatic conditions do not require it and in any case regular physical activity is not practiced, the body implements a negative transformation mechanism. Brown cells are not “needed” to contain large quantities of fat while white cells become “preferable”, which therefore replace the brown ones. And the white cells “swell” and multiply until they form large amounts of internal fat. This process, which normally develops over many years when more calories are introduced through diet than are consumed through physical activity, leads to overweight and obesity. Above all, it can promote metabolic syndrome, that is, a set of conditions that lead to a less sensitivity to the action of insulin (the hormone that buffers excess glucose in the blood) and therefore diabetes, increased cholesterol and triglycerides in the blood and increased blood pressure.
When physical activity counts
The management of the human body can be compared to an energy balance. Income and expenses should be almost equal. Unfortunately, however, in those who choose the path of sedentary lifestyle the balance is altered, with lower energy consumption and therefore greater ease in the accumulation of fat in the body. Actually lack of physical activity it does not favor overweight and obesity only due to an “income-expenditure” cost of the body, but also through other factors, such as a modification of the individual’s psychological conditions. Typically, between 60 and 80 percent of the calories the body consumes daily are lost in the so-called resting metabolism. In this phase, however, the body uses some already available substances to produce energy, such as glucose or fatty acids. When it happens instead a physical activity (which affects the global caloric balance by 15-20 percent) and prolonged muscular work, the body needs an energy “supplement”, which it draws from the fat deposits found in the lipid cells. For this reason, if you practice little physical activity it is extremely difficult to “consume” excess fat.
This is how you get fat
Adipose tissue is fundamental for the human body, because it allows us to have a store of energy stored in the body in the form of fat. But in order not to create excess weight, the energy consumption and the chemical reactions ensured by them must be equal to the calorie intake. When the balance between the body’s caloric “income” from food and consumption, especially in the form of physical effort that requires energy production, is altered, the body tends to accumulate energy. And it does this by “keeping” it available in the form of fat. The deposit in fact leads to the “filling” of the adipose cells with a “drop” of fat, which tends to enlarge the volume of the cells themselves. When this occurs we encounter the so-called cellular “hypertrophy”.that is, the growth of the cell volume. But if this “enlargement” is not sufficient to contain the stored fat, the cells tend to multiply, in a process called “hyperplasia”. When this occurs, the number of fat cells in the body grows, and even if the desired results are obtained with a weight loss program whereby the cell is “emptyed” of its lipid content by reducing its size, there still remains a numerical excess of cells adipose. This explains the ease of “relapses” when you start eating normally again, because the fat “containers” are larger than they should be. And, if nothing is done keep calorie consumption highthe lipid cells tend to “fill up” again.
How the environment and nutrition favor overweight
Anthropological studies on the evolution of the human species confirm that human beings are almost entirely similar to those who inhabited the earth fifty thousand years ago. And even the metabolism of man and woman of the third millennium are almost identical to those of the ancestors who lived in caves. But the differences in terms of living environment and economic conditions they were very profound, with influences on nutrition and obviously on physical activity. Research says that in recent centuries there has been an exponential increase in food availability, at least in industrialized countries. Furthermore, climatic conditions have changed with the introduction of heating and means of transport have made human beings increasingly sedentary, with serious consequences in terms of physical activity. The progressive decline in physical exercise, combined with a greater availability of food, has therefore laid the foundations for the progressive increase in body weight of many individuals. This is why we must be careful, both with a balanced diet and with regular physical activity, which has various metabolic advantages.