UMMS Affiliation
Department of Medicine, Division of Cardiovascular Medicine
Publication Date
2015-06-30
Document Type
Article
Disciplines
Endocrinology | Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Metabolism
Abstract
In murine and human brown adipose tissue (BAT), mitochondria are powerful generators of heat that safely metabolize fat, a feature that has great promise in the fight against obesity and diabetes. Recent studies suggest that the actions of mitochondria extend beyond their conventional role as generators of heat. There is mounting evidence that impaired mitochondrial respiratory capacity is accompanied by attenuated expression of Ucp1 and other BAT-selective genes, implying that mitochondria exert transcriptional control over the brown fat gene program. In this review, we discuss the current understanding of brown fat mitochondria, their potential role in transcriptional control of the brown fat gene program, and potential strategies to treat obesity in humans by leveraging thermogenesis in brown adipocytes.
Keywords
brown fat, brown fat gene program, mitochondria, respiratory capacity, thermogenesis
Rights and Permissions
Copyright © 2015 Nam and Cooper. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
DOI of Published Version
10.3389/fendo.2015.00104
Source
Front Endocrinol (Lausanne). 2015 Jun 30;6:104. doi: 10.3389/fendo.2015.00104. eCollection 2015. Link to article on publisher's site
Journal/Book/Conference Title
Frontiers in endocrinology
Related Resources
PubMed ID
26175716
Repository Citation
Nam M, Cooper MP. (2015). Role of Energy Metabolism in the Brown Fat Gene Program. Open Access Articles. https://doi.org/10.3389/fendo.2015.00104. Retrieved from https://escholarship.umassmed.edu/oapubs/2728
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.