I grew up eating the same diet as the rest of my family, yet I am the only one in who was/is obese. I weighed nearly 11 lbs. at birth, and have been obese my entire life, unlike the rest of my family. Oh, and my mother was a registered dietitian who worked at a regional medical center, so my diet (and my family's diet) did not consist of fast food or a lot of packaged, processed foods. She cooked from scratch. Also, I grew up in the late 60's/early 70's, when we kids spent our free time playing outside and not parked in front of a computer or TV screen. My point is that it's not as black & white an issue to claim obesity is a choice that is caused *solely* due to poor diet and lack of exercise. There ARE genetics involved, as well as medical and/or neurological factors. Sorry to disappoint the fat Nazis who, because of their own prejudice, ignorance and lack of compassion, would just as soon see all fat people wiped off the earth as see them helped by medical research such as this. FYI: the AMA recognizes obesity as a disease; yet it is still socially and legally acceptable to discriminate against the obese.

Next on Dr Oz .......

All these silly bastards sayng eat healthy do excersise and all this bs. No, there is one answer, If your fat, DONT EAT, become ethiopian for a month youll be fine. want muscle? Old uncle roid has the answer. Dont want the side effects or to become ill, then enjoy your body for what it is, no ones perfect everyones body is different, experiment try different things and if it still doesnt work, use cheat codes. :P

Sooooo......... freezing ones self is a good way to lose weight.........

any person with a restricting based eating disorder could tell you that cold burns more calories. In the tips&tricks you often see it's suggested to take cold baths/showers.
This isn't any news to us lmao.

I can't stop laughing whenever I see that picture of the fat lab rat.

He's not fat-- he's big boned!

1) Mice can increase their energy expenditure a lot. Humans can't. Also, when we get cold, our appetite generally increases so energy intake increases.

Honestly, I think it's great. all those who say "Diet and exercise quit looking for the easy way out" how is that helping? Is it lowering the obesity rate? Is it saving lives? No. It is sad that it has to come down to a medication to lower obesity, but if thats what it takes, so be it. If it saves lives then we should support it.

It seems exercise works as well on this fat tissue "browning" thing, just by different pathways

This is great, but does it wear off? If not that would start increasing the food consumption of many people.

that isn't sciences fault, blame the media and your laws involving the media

I know a drug that burns more fat.

It's called "Medium Chain Triglycerides" or in other words, coconut oil.

It's not a "drug", it's just one of the oils containing the most saturated fatty acids, even if their carbon chains are quite short.
How could it "burn fat"??

I thought only infants had brown fat because they cant regulate body temperature.

Am I the only one that's concerned about adipose or am I watching too much Doctor Who?

Nope! I saw Adipose and those cute little white fat things with the snaggletooth waving was all i could think of.

Bears use brown fat while hibernating. It is a very good insulator and it seems they can burn it without using much energy. This could be a great way for the terminally obese to get back closer to reasonable weight, though it may raise their body temperature too high if they are not careful. Burning brown fat seems to generate more waste heat than the other stuff.

Overweight individuals already have trouble keeping cool in warm weather. If this drug ever comes to market I do not look forward to seeing the side effect of further elevated body temperature. :(

just look up what heat stroke does... the side effects of over heating have been studied already

Fat, sweet and tasty fat! Mmm!

The real question is what foods (or combinations of foods) naturally produce IL-4 concentrations?

What about the heat and core body temperature? The whole idea rests on the fact that brown adipose tissue burns fat in conditions of low temperature, thus providing energy (that is, heat) to maintain homeostasis. What will happen if you trick your body into thinking that you are "freezing", and it's actually a cozy 25 degrees C outside? Rats are one thing and they lose body heat much faster than adult humans. I see potential problems with overheating, dehydration and hyperhydrosis.

Please do not put the idea that "fat burns calories" in our heads when calories are in the fat and the metabolism burns the calories.

They may use this word instead of "adipocyte metabolism" because its easier to understand. ^^'

TO ALL :

Weight gain & loss depends on MANY factors.

As a MSc biologist student, ex-medical student, ex-anorexic for 10 years and quite skinny girl (~53Kgs for 173~4cm), I studied a lot at university & by myself in scientific books & articles on this particular subject (and obviously I also experienced on myself)...

And my conclusion is (drums... :p ) :

Obesity is a COMPLEX phenomenon, even if it appears simple. \o/
In addition, your american society is providing a "perfect"environment for its rise:
- abundant "addictive" hyper palatable food everywhere (I was so shocked the first time I came to Boston...)
- completely destroyed "meal time ritual" (I mean sitting together on a table at a particular time and enjoy it instead of absent-mindedly eating a meal tray while watching TV or a sandwich while doing window shop...),
- highly agressive marketing and...
- no true popular knowledge of what a really healthy diet is.
This has been lost along the way. As our modern way of life progressed, we forgot our animal basic needs...

Plus when people don't just think that all that matters is the calorie amount, they still have a lot of what I call "mythologies" on the subject and often imagine that a "healthy" diet always implies restrictions, no pleasure, no fat, no sugar, even often no carbohydrates at all... as if "healthy" and "lean" were synonymous and as if eating was a sign of weakness, almost a sin!... especially in women who are continuously harassed with contradictory demands and wrong informations from stupid women's magazines, advertisements, etc.

It's thus no surprise if the two first risk factors for anorexia are:
1) being female
`2) live in a Western country.

And no surprise either to see fat people inexorably continuing to gain weight...
So the obese population has kept growing year after year (not only in America) and now some people are far too fat to do sport!
Some are even already sick, morbid obesity is a real pathology you know, you can eventually die from it.
They first need to lose enough weight so that they won't hurt themselves by exercising.
So maybe, in some cases, the benefit/risk balance would bend in the favor of a "shortcut".
That's why medications are for.
And yes, when they are effective, they often have side effects.

So...
Could you please stop being so judgmental with fat people (and scientists and everybody in general), who actually often try very hard and sometimes diet their whole life, in vain?
Yes, they often ignore a lot of things... But so do you, you just showed it right here and I'm not going to do a whole 1000 hour english biology course on this page to explain it.
Not worth the energetic expenditure.
Please educate yourself before lecturing and/or blaming others and try a bit of tolerance and compassion, in general, in everyday life, with people you meet IRL but also on the web...
It actually makes human relationships easier, you know? (and therefore it reduces the amount of stress sometimes responsible for weight changes).

PS: I'm French so please don't mind the misspellings and other English mistakes.

Thank you, Claire! <3

I think you did a lovely job of explaining that.

Thanks. ^^

Actually, the sit-down daily meals are part of the problem. People who sit down 3 times a day for a regular meal tend to gorge themselves because they haven't eaten anything in 6 hours. It's much healthier to eat several smaller meals throughout the day with light snacks in between. This keeps the metabolism steady and prevents you from overeating in order to quickly appease your long-term, built-up hunger at dinner time.

Can you support that claim? I see this one all the time from bodybuilders and fitness people. I haven't ever seen any valid evidence though.

Yes, having grown up in family with a very traditional father that liked to eat 3 sit-down meals as a family (almost all healthy foods, and of course except for lunch during the week, but still a healthy lunch that my mom would make) and then having shifted to an eating habit of eating basically all the same foods, but in smaller proportions with snacks of yogurt, granola bars, cheese, etc. in between the meals, and even at night, so I'm not fasting for 10 hours and then starving in the morning, I have found it remarkably easier to keep body fat down. But again, I have an overall ability to maintain some self control and pick healthy snacks unlike some of the fat cows at my work that just sit and snack on vending machine chips and sodas throughout the day.

There's really no scientific evidence supporting the claim eating numerous, smaller meals is better for staying lean than eating 3 bigger ones. Unless you're counting bro science.

Well, we eat 3 times a day in France and stay quite a long time at the table, not everywhere & all the time as I saw in America... And we're far from being as obese as you!
XD Plus you're wrong on the fact that it is "healthier". It's not, it attacks you teeth with acid (and I'm pretty sure you're not going to brush your teeth each time) and disrupts the physiological hormonal & muscular bowel contraction rhythm (alternance between periods of peristalsis & segmentation+contraction).

Unless you're drinking soda or eating apples / citrus fruits all day, the acid isn't an issue. The other acids come from bacteria that live off the food in your teeth, and those don't just explode in population size the moment you eat food. Sugar itself doesn't directly "rot" your teeth as most stay-at-home moms would have you believe...it just allows more bacteria to eventually grow if you don't eventually brush. And yeah...you have the ability to brush your teeth or at least chew some sugar-free gum during work in almost all job settings.

Wow this comment thread is toxic.

True ^^'

Sounds terrifying.

It's pretty awesome that it only took like four comments for the 101st Keyboard Fitness Commandos (aka the Flying Fat Shamers) to share their awesome wisdom about diet and exercise with the rest of us.

All the people saying just "eat less" read a book geez, there are numerous metabolic disorders that make people body's work against them. I have PCOS and doctors told me to diet and exercise alone and it just doesn't do it all the way. I needed some key supplements that other people don't necessarily need, I had to UP the fat intake while lowering carbs and cutting sugar, all the whole they are telling me I will get diabetes because I weigh 230, telling me I need drugs, and look! by the bloodwork I'm healthy as a horse, have a low A1C number, low cholesterol, and I'm losing weight without any drugs or insulin. not everyone Is the same just get over it it doesn't affect you anyways.

It's a very good example. The solution of your problem was completely anti-intuitive.

So basically.... no good results yet. Ah.

Silly scientists, the adipose http://media.tumblr.com/tum...

Silly you... XD lol

Some of the skinniest people I know are unemployed. Lack of food for thought.

This is hilarious because as much as I love your site, it's always COVERED with the scammiest web ads for steroids and diets!!

AdBlockplus add on for firefox

AdBlock extension for Chrome.

I suppose science should do something with all the fat Americans... because Americans sure as hell aren't going to do anything for themselves but keep eating like shit, then complaining that they're fat, join the diabetic epidemic as another statistic, raise healthcare costs, etc etc... When really it just boils down to watching what you shove in your face and a little movement throughout the day.

/rant.