White Plump

White Plump
by Pam Peeke MD MPH FACP Published: Apr 24, 2014
From Women's Health for The Vitamin Shoppe
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Not all body fat is the same. Learn the difference for better health
By Pam Peeke, MD, MPH, FACP, best-selling author and expert on health, fitness, and nutrition , republished with permission from Maria's Farm Country Kitchen
While a research scientist at the National Institutes of Health, I became known as the “fat doctor,” a title I held with great pride. My work entailed tag-teaming with surgeons in the operating room and harvesting human fat cells during surgery. Bless every one of the wonderful research subjects who agreed—rather happily, I might add!—to let me remove a small sample of fat from various parts of their bodies, both deep inside (deep in the belly) and just under the skin (subcutaneous). Next, these gleaming gelatinous globs of fat were carefully placed in the portable liquid nitrogen cylinder that accompanied me everywhere. Then it was off to my lab to prep the specimens for our experiments.
Hunched over my lab bench, I would marvel at the beauty, power, and mystery of the fat cells, or adipocytes (adip=fat, cyte=cell), I beheld under my specialized microscopes. It also occurred to me that most people probably don’t have a clue as to what fat cells do other than inspire torment and angst when they’re trying to crowbar themselves into a pair of jeans.
So how about a quick primer on all things fat, so that you can, as I have, learn to appreciate, not disparage, these incredible and integral parts of our anatomy? I’m only talking about fat as a physical entity and won’t be speaking to any issues related to why people are under- or overweight. This is just an anatomy lesson!
So here’s a brief summary of fat facts, starting with the two types we have.
1. Brown Fat
This fat is composed of several small lipid (fat) droplets and a large number of iron-containing mitochondria (the cell’s heat-burning engine). The iron, along with lots of blood tiny blood vessels, gives this fat its brownish appearance. Brown fat is usually found in the front and back of the neck and upper back.
The purpose of brown fat is to burn calories in order to generate heat. That’s why brown fat is often referred to as the “good” fat, since it helps us burn, not store, calories. Brown fat is derived from muscle tissue and is found primarily in hibernating animals and newborns. After life as an infant, the quantity of brown fat significantly decreases. Adults who have comparatively more brown fat tend to be younger and slender and have normal blood sugar levels.
You generate brown fat by: exercising, which can convert white-yellow fat to a more metabolically active brown fat; getting enough high-quality sleep, as proper melatonin production influences the production of brown fat; and exposing yourself to the cold regularly, such as exercising outdoors in the wintertime or in a cold room. Lowering the temperature in your living and working spaces is another tip.
Bottom line: You want as much of this type of fat as possible. Bring on the brown!
2. White Fat.
This type of fat is composed of a single lipid droplet and has far less mitochondria and blood vessels, thus resulting in its lighter white or yellow appearance. White fat is the predominant form of fat in the body, originating from connective tissue.
White fat has many purposes. It provides the largest energy reserve in the body. It’s a thermal insulator and cushion for our internal organs, and cushions during external interactions with our environment (that’s code for a soft landing when we fall on our behind!). It is a major endocrine organ, producing one form of estrogen as well as leptin, a hormone that helps regulate appetite and hunger. It’s also got receptors for insulin, growth hormone, adrenaline, and cortisol (stress hormone). So, it’s a myth that fat cells just sit there and do nothing all day long!
White fat is found, oh heck, you know where it’s found. Just look in the mirror! In women, excess fat accumulates around the hips, thighs, buttocks, and breasts until perimenopause (the 40s), when fat is redistributed to the abdomen as well. Men tend to gather excess fat primarily in the belly region most of their lives.
An excess of white fat inside the belly (visceral fat) is associated with metabolic syndrome—a group of symptoms that signal an increased risk for heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. Location of body fat really counts! Excess white fat throughout the body is associated with an increased risk of breast, colon, esophageal, gall bladder, and pancreatic cancer. It’s also associated with sleep apnea, and physical disabilities such as knee arthritis.
Here’s how much white fat a “normal-weight” person would carry throughout a lifetime: Men’s body fat range is 15 to 25 percent; women’s is 15 to 30 percent. Your generic 154-pound person would carry about 20 pounds of fat. One pound of stored fat contains roughly 4,000 calories, so 20 pounds has 80,000 calories of energy storage. If you required 2,000 calories to live per day, you’d last about 40 days on a desert island. These numbers aren’t meant to be perfect or exact, but instead, give you a broad, general idea.
You generate white fat by: consuming too many calories and expending too few calories.
Bottom line: As a species, white fat is very important to our survival. It’s a matter of how much and where it’s located. You want to control your visceral fat level (keeping your waist circumference to less than 35 inches if you’re a woman, and to less than 40 inches if you’re a man) and keep your total body fat within the normal ranges for each gender.
Does white fat interact with brown fat? You better believe it. New research shows that when people overeat, they not only increase their total amount of white fat, but the overconsumption results in their brown fat becoming dysfunctional and thus unable to burn calories.
All right, the lesson is over, and now you’re locked and loaded with new knowledge about all things adipose tissue.
Starting today, make it a point to achieve two major goals: Optimize your brown fat function and manage your white fat load—by doing precisely the same thing. That is, eat whole foods in moderation, stay active, practice stress resilience, and lead a mindful lifestyle. You’ll keep those mitochondria hummin’ while your health and wellness skyrocket!
-- About the author: Pamela Peeke, MD, MPH, FACP, is a Pew Scholar in nutrition and metabolism, assistant professor of medicine at the University of Maryland, and a fellow of the American College of Physicians. A triathlete and mountaineer, she is known as “the doc who walks the talk,” living what she’s learned as an expert in health, fitness, and nutrition. Dr. Peeke is featured as one of America’s leading women physicians in the National Institutes of Health Changing Face of Medicine exhibit at the National Library of Medicine. Her current research at the University of Maryland centers on the connection between meditation and overeating. She is the author of many best-selling books, including Fight Fat after Forty . Her new book is the New York Times best-seller The Hunger Fix .
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Fatty tissue composed of white adipocytes
Distribution of white adipose tissue in the human body.

^ AACE/ACE Obesity Task Force (1998). "AACE/ACE position statement on the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of obesity". Endocr Pract . 4 (5).

^ Gravholt CH, Møller N, Jensen MD, Christiansen JS, Schmitz O (May 2001). "Physiological levels of glucagon do not influence lipolysis in abdominal adipose tissue as assessed by microdialysis" . The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism . 86 (5): 2085–9. doi : 10.1210/jcem.86.5.7460 . PMID 11344211 .

^ Lawrence AM (1969). "Glucagon". Annual Review of Medicine . 20 : 207–22. doi : 10.1146/annurev.me.20.020169.001231 . PMID 4893399 .

^ Spirovski MZ, Kovacev VP, Spasovska M, Chernick SS (February 1975). "Effect of ACTH on lipolysis in adipose tissue of normal and adrenalectomized rats in vivo". The American Journal of Physiology . 228 (2): 382–5. doi : 10.1152/ajplegacy.1975.228.2.382 . PMID 164126 .

^ Kiwaki K, Levine JA (November 2003). "Differential effects of adrenocorticotropic hormone on human and mouse adipose tissue". Journal of Comparative Physiology B: Biochemical, Systemic, and Environmental Physiology . 173 (8): 675–8. doi : 10.1007/s00360-003-0377-1 . PMID 12925881 . S2CID 12459319 .

^ Stallknecht B, Simonsen L, Bülow J, Vinten J, Galbo H (December 1995). "Effect of training on epinephrine-stimulated lipolysis determined by microdialysis in human adipose tissue". The American Journal of Physiology . 269 (6 Pt 1): E1059-66. doi : 10.1152/ajpendo.1995.269.6.E1059 . PMID 8572197 .

^ Zhou Y, Rui L (June 2013). "Leptin signaling and leptin resistance" . Frontiers of Medicine . 7 (2): 207–22. doi : 10.1007/s11684-013-0263-5 . PMC 4069066 . PMID 23580174 .

^ Jump up to: a b c d e Symonds, Michael (2017). Adipose Tissue Biology . Springer. p. 150. ISBN 978-3-319-52031-5 .

^ Pavelka, Margit; Roth, Jürgen (2010). Functional Ultrastructure . Vienna: Springer. p. 290. ISBN 978-3-211-99390-3 .

^ Ahmadian M, Suh JM, Hah N, Liddle C, Atkins AR, Downes M, Evans RM (May 2013). "PPARγ signaling and metabolism: the good, the bad and the future". Nature Medicine . 19 (5): 557–66. doi :10.1038/nm.3159. PMC 3870016. PMID 23652116

White adipose tissue or white fat is one of the two types of adipose tissue found in mammals. The other kind is brown adipose tissue . White adipose tissue is composed of monolocular adipocytes.

In humans, the healthy amount of white adipose tissue varies with age, but composes between 6-25% of body weight in adult men and 14-35% in adult women. [1] [ additional citation(s) needed ]

Its cells contain a single large fat droplet , which forces the nucleus to be squeezed into a thin rim at the periphery. They have receptors for insulin , sex hormones , norepinephrine , and glucocorticoids .

White adipose tissue is used for energy storage. Upon release of insulin from the pancreas , white adipose cells' insulin receptors cause a dephosphorylation cascade that leads to the inactivation of hormone-sensitive lipase . It was previously thought that upon release of glucagon from the pancreas, glucagon receptors cause a phosphorylation cascade that activates hormone-sensitive lipase, causing the breakdown of the stored fat to fatty acids , which are exported into the blood and bound to albumin , and glycerol , which is exported into the blood freely. There is actually no evidence at present that glucagon has any effect on lipolysis in white adipose tissue. [2] Glucagon is now thought to act exclusively on the liver to trigger glycogenolysis and gluconeogenesis . [3] The trigger for this process in white adipose tissue is instead now thought to be adrenocorticotropic hormone , [4] [5] adrenaline [6] and noradrenaline [ citation needed ] . Fatty acids are taken up by muscle and cardiac tissue as a fuel source, and glycerol is taken up by the liver for gluconeogenesis.

White adipose tissue also acts as a thermal insulator, helping to maintain body temperature.

The hormone leptin is primarily manufactured in the adipocytes of white adipose tissue [7] which also produces another hormone, asprosin .

White adipose tissue is most abundant in mammals and its distribution greatly varies among different species. [8] Usually white adipose tissue can be found in two different locations of the body where it is stored: subcutaneous adipose tissue and intra-abdominal adipose tissue. Subcutaneous adipose tissue is directly underneath the skin, while the intra-abdominal adipose tissue surrounds the organs inside the abdomen such as intestine and kidneys. [8] The intra-abdominal adipose tissues covers the thoracic and abdominal cavity . The visceral adipose tissue is part of the intra-abdominal adipose tissue that surrounds the intestine for the most part. [8] White adipose tissue exists mostly as a single adipocytes in the subcutaneous tissue. [9]

In humans, white adipose tissue starts to develop during early to mid-gestation period. White adipose tissue consists of white adipocytes, which are the lipid storage cells. They are differentiated from undifferentiated preadipocytes through transcriptional cascade. This process is regulated by the nuclear receptor peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ (PPARγ), a protein regulating gene involved in regulation of fatty acid storage and glucose metabolism and members of the CCAAT/enhancer-binding protein family, type of transcription factors that promotes gene expression . [10] PPARγ is required for both the adipogenesis and maintenance of the adipocytes.

White adipose tissue exists in various depots that may have different types of adipocytes. [8] That is, different depots in different locations have different intrinsic properties. This led to various theories to find the adipogenic lineage of the white adipose tissue depots. A hypothesis is that the precursors for the different types of adipocytes are mesenchymal stem cells which differentiates by the influence of specific gene expression into specialized white preadipocytes. Such genes are Shox2 , En1 , Tbx15 , HoxC9 , HoxC8 , and HoxA5 . [8] The study of the gene expression is important as they can be indicative of various health issues such as obesity related risk factors including diabetes and metabolic conditions.

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: to drop, sink, or come in contact suddenly or heavily

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: to favor or decide in favor of someone or something strongly or emphatically

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1

: to drop, cast, or place suddenly or heavily

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: to give support and favorable publicity to

: a sudden plunge, fall, or blow

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: with a sudden or heavy drop

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: without qualification : directly

plump out of luck

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a plump of ducks rose at the same time — H. D. Thoreau

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: having a full rounded usually pleasing form

a plump woman

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there was a squirrel on the sidewalk plump in front of us

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