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| Sensory and sympathetic nerves connected to brown fat through the nervous system. Sensory nerves (red/orange) send information from fat to the brain and sympathetic nerves (green/orange) send the signal for fat to be activated or break down. |
DIABETES DIGEST – Mar. 27, 2015 – Just as there is good cholesterol and bad cholesterol, body fat comes in two types, bad fat is white and forms the body’s store of energy. Good fat is brown and fuels the body’s “furnace” that generates body heat. It is abundant in animals that hibernate.
A new study in this month’s The Journal of Neuroscience, shows how brown fat in mice and hamsters communicates with the brain through sensory nerves to help regulate fat stores, and tells the brain how much is burned. This could lead to development of drugs to stimulate the activation of brown fat and increase the body’s metabolism rate.
