title: Anatomical localization, gene expression profiling and functional characterization of adult human neck brown fat.
abstract: The imbalance between energy intake and expenditure is the underlying cause of the current obesity and diabetes pandemics. Central to these pathologies is the fat depot: white adipose tissue (WAT) stores excess calories, and brown adipose tissue (BAT) consumes fuel for thermogenesis using tissue-specific uncoupling protein 1 (UCP1). BAT was once thought to have a functional role in rodents and human infants only, but it has been recently shown that in response to mild cold exposure, adult human BAT consumes more glucose per gram than any other tissue. In addition to this nonshivering thermogenesis, human BAT may also combat weight gain by becoming more active in the setting of increased whole-body energy intake. This phenomenon of BAT-mediated diet-induced thermogenesis has been observed in rodents and suggests that activation of human BAT could be used as a safe treatment for obesity and metabolic dysregulation. In this study, we isolated anatomically defined neck fat from adult human volunteers and compared its gene expression, differentiation capacity and basal oxygen consumption to different mouse adipose depots. Although the properties of human neck fat vary substantially between individuals, some human samples share many similarities with classical, also called constitutive, rodent BAT.
authors.affiliation: Section of Integrative Physiology and Metabolism, Research Division, Joslin Diabetes Center, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA. aaron.cypess@joslin.harvard.edu
authors.forename: Aaron M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Cypess
authors.forename: Andrew P
authors.initials: AP
authors.lastname: White
authors.forename: Cecile
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Vernochet
authors.forename: Tim J
authors.initials: TJ
authors.lastname: Schulz
authors.forename: Ruidan
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Xue
authors.forename: Christina A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Sass
authors.forename: Tian Liang
authors.initials: TL
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.forename: Carla
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Roberts-Toler
authors.forename: Lauren S
authors.initials: LS
authors.lastname: Weiner
authors.forename: Cathy
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Sze
authors.forename: Aron T
authors.initials: AT
authors.lastname: Chacko
authors.forename: Laura N
authors.initials: LN
authors.lastname: Deschamps
authors.forename: Lindsay M
authors.initials: LM
authors.lastname: Herder
authors.forename: Nathan
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Truchan
authors.forename: Allison L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Glasgow
authors.forename: Ashley R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Holman
authors.forename: Alina
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Gavrila
authors.forename: Per-Olof
authors.initials: PO
authors.lastname: Hasselgren
authors.forename: Marcelo A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Mori
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Molla
authors.forename: Yu-Hua
authors.initials: YH
authors.lastname: Tseng
mesh_terms: D017667:Adipocytes / Q000166:cytology; D000273:Adipose Tissue; D002001:Adipose Tissue, Brown / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000502:physiology*; D000328:Adult; D000818:Animals; D002454:Cell Differentiation; D019070:Cell Lineage; D016000:Cluster Analysis; D015870:Gene Expression; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation; D006801:Humans; D007473:Ion Channels / Q000378:metabolism; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D051379:Mice; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D024101:Mitochondrial Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D010101:Oxygen Consumption; D022722:Thermogenesis; D000071256:Uncoupling Protein 1
chemical_list: D007473:Ion Channels; D024101:Mitochondrial Proteins; C000604371:UCP1 protein, human; C000604372:Ucp1 protein, mouse; D000071256:Uncoupling Protein 1