This article is more than 5 years old. Information may no longer be current.
scWAT: Exercise 'trained' fat, improved glucose homeostasis
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts
CHICAGO — Exercise training led to adaptations in subcutaneous white adipose tissue in mice and humans, thus improving metabolic parameters, according to data presented here during the President’s Oral Session.
“I think everyone is well aware that there are huge increases in the rates of type 2 diabetes in the world. While there has been a great deal of emphasis on this as being due to the fact that people eat high-fat food, I would argue that in fact the lack of exercise is just as important, or even more important than the increase in high fat feeding and caloric consumption,” Laurie J. Goodyear, PhD, senior investigator and head of the section on integrative physiology and metabolism at Joslin Diabetes Center, and an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, said during a press conference here.
First, Goodyear and colleagues examined the impact of exercise on subcutaneous white adipose tissue (scWAT) by studying mice. After 11 days of voluntary wheel training (70 km/mouse), they discovered significant changes to scWAT, included an increased expression of roughly 1,550 genes, Goodyear said (P<.05). Further, brown fat-like adipocytes within the scWAT soon developed.
Some of the pathways that were changed included: oxidant stress and signaling, metabolism, mitochondrial biogenesis and membrane transport. Exercise training was also found to change the adipose tissue in the mouse. To determine the effects in humans, Goodyear and colleagues collaborated with researchers from Copenhagen. They included 10 males, aged 18 to 40 years, with a BMI <30. According to data, the training increased patients’ VO2max by 20.4% (95% CI, 8.7-43.6). This training also increased the "browning" of white fat, thus improving glucose homeostasis, Kristin I. Stanford, PhD, a post-doctoral fellow at Joslin Diabetes Center in Boston, said during the press conference.
Furthermore, to determine if the trained fat affected the body’s use of glucose, Stanford and colleagues transplanted the exercise-trained mouse fat into the high-fat, sedentary mice. Ultimately, data indicated an increase in glucose tolerance and insulin sensitivity for 9 days after the transplantation, Stanford said.
“Exercise really can train your fat. Exercise training clearly has very profound effects on subcutaneous fat; it decreased cell size, whole body lipids levels and metabolism, and increased mitochondria and caused browning,” Stanford said. – by Samantha Costa
For more information:
Stanford KI. #17-OR. Presented at: ADA Scientific Sessions; June 21-25, 2013; Chicago.
Disclosure: The researchers report no relevant financial disclosures.
Perspective
Back to Top
Steven R. Smith, MD
The data presented are very novel. There are a couple of findings that we haven’t seen before. For some time now, research has hinted at something coming out of the muscle that improves insulin sensitivity, or that maybe muscle is just the target of exercise. However, this is completely new and unique. Nobody has ever thought the muscle could communicate with the fat cells and then the fat cells could improve metabolic parameters, and I believe that’s really the new and novel piece here.
Also, we’ve known fat is an endocrine organ for a very long time. However, we’ve not yet connected that with how exercise allows people to improve their glycemic control and other health outcomes. Therefore, I believe that’s the other novel piece to this study.
When I talk to endocrinologists about exercising their patients with diabetes, they tend to be reluctant. Part of that has to do with the fact that it’s hard to get people to exercise. What this study says to endocrinologists is there is some science behind how exercise is working and they just need to urge patients with diabetes to exercise as much as possible.
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts