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Wouldn’t it be nice if you could activate a system in fat cells that prevents them from growing when you eat a lot of fats? That’s exactly what researchers at Washington University did in mice. Now the question is whether this knowledge can be safely translated to humans.
Inhibiting Fat Cell Growth
Fat cells come and go, but in adults, the total number remains relatively constant. Overweight is thus mainly the result of fat cells that can hold larger fat droplets. Researchers at Washington University looked at the functioning of the so-called
Hedgehog protein pathway. This protein is active in many tissues. Previous research has shown that the protein can inhibit the development of fat cells [2,3]. By activating this protein, (white) fat tissue was found to be inhibited in growth in earlier research [2].
Protein Inhibits Fat Cell Growth on High-Fat Diet
Researchers at Washington University wanted to know what happens when you genetically modify mice to activate this protein while they are on a high-fat diet. In the image next to this text, you can see the difference between normal mice and ‘Hedgehog mice’. Both are on the same high-fat diet. After eight weeks, the high-fat diet had a significant effect on the fat mass of the normal mice. However, this growth of fat tissue was inhibited in the Hedgehog mice. As a result, they had the same weight as a control group of mice on a normal diet.
In addition to the protective effect on fat mass, activating the protein had more benefits. Blood sugar in the Hedgehog mice was lower, and insulin sensitivity was better.
The effect of activating Hedgehog was modest in mice on a normal diet, but significant when a high-fat diet was given. Exactly what you would want to see. They also saw that the conversion of glucose into fat was inhibited.
In this research, the growth of brown fat tissue was also inhibited.
From Mouse to Human
However, much more research needs to be done before these findings could potentially help humans in the fight against obesity.
The research has only shown that the
Hedgehog protein pathway can theoretically help to counteract the growth of fat mass. In practice, however, the side effects need to be studied. For example, some types of cancers are linked to increased Hedgehog activity. Therefore, the researchers will also look for methods to make any medication based on Hedgehog work as locally as possible. Maybe they should talk to the researchers from Singapore who developed fat-burning patches. Patches with tiny needles that should apply medication locally to the fat cells.
If we can come up with strategies to carefully target fat cells, then I think activating this pathway could be effective in the fight against obesity
References
- Yu Shi, Fanxin Long. Hedgehog signaling via Gli2 prevents obesity induced by high-fat diet in adult mice. eLife, 2017; 6
- Drosophila genome-wide obesity screen reveals hedgehog as a determinant of brown versus white adipose cell fate
JA Pospisilik D Schramek H Schnidar SJ Cronin NT Nehme X Zhang C Knauf PD Cani K Aumayr J Todoric M Bayer A Haschemi V Puviindran K Tar M Orthofer GG Neely G Dietzl A Manoukian M Funovics G Prager O Wagner D Ferrandon F Aberger CC Hui H Esterbauer JM Penninger (2010)
Cell 140:148–160.
- Hedgehog signaling plays a conserved role in inhibiting fat formation JM Suh X Gao J McKay R McKay Z Salo JM Graff (2006)
Cell Metabolism 3:25–34. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cmet.2005.11.012
