Scientists May Have Found The Enzyme That Prevents The Body From Accumulating Fat From Pizzas And Burgers
Fat accumulation can be prevented by eliminating an enzyme called, NAMPT, which has been linked to obesity.
There are those have an ample amount of restraint against their craving for bingeing. Then there are those that hope foods like pizzas, chips and burgers can become a staple part of an otherwise ¡®healthy¡¯ diet someday.
Our bodies are naturally efficient at storing fat from food into fat tissue in our body.
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It does this so that our bodies can generate energy from the food we eat. Why?
From an evolutionary perspective our bodies have evolved to store the fat we derive from food to use as energy in times of need. That¡¯s because the availability of food used to be so scarce millions of years ago that the body learnt to store fat as a backup for its energy expenditure.
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The problem, however, is that today we have too much access to high calorie foods, but our body continues to store fat the same way it used to. Our bodies impressive ability to retain fat from food has, indeed, become one of the key causes of an obesity epidemic world over.
Well, the good news is that a research team at the University of Copenhagen might have just found a way to completely prevent the body from storing fat.
An enzyme called, NAMPT, that has been linked to obesity in both human beings and animals as its presence in your fatty tissues has been known to facilitate your body¡¯s ability to store fat.
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The team found that removing a single enzyme called, NAMPT, in animals lead to them not being able to gain weight, even after being fed on a fatty diet.
The researchers realised that the mice they test not only managed to keep the weight off despite being fatty diet, but also ended up being able to control their blood sugar levels better even after 12 weeks.
"We gave the mice a diet that more or less corresponds to continuously eating burgers and pizza," explains Karen N?rgaard Nielsen, first author on the study.
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"Still, it was impossible for them to expand their fat tissue. Our ultimate goal is that by understanding these fundamental underpinnings of how we become obese, we can apply our finding to the development of novel treatment strategies for metabolic disease."
As fascinating as this study is the therapy needs to be investigated further before it gets used on human beings, as eliminating it completely from human beings can bring with it other harmful consequences; since the enzyme is connected to various organs and tissues.
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"NAMPT in fat tissue was likely once an extraordinary benefit to our ancestors but in today's society full of high-fat, calorically-dense foods, it may now pose a liability," says Zachary Gerhart-Hines, a corresponding author on the study.
Regi is the Health Editor of Health Me Up. He believes a fit body and mind are the key to being in the pink of health.