Rockefeller University — ScienceDaily — 4 January 2021
A new study in Nature Medicine of over 52,000 participants — by far the largest of its kind in humans — finds that people with detectable brown fat were less likely to suffer cardiac and metabolic conditions ranging from type 2 diabetes to coronary artery disease. Only 4.6% of people with detectable brown fat had type 2 diabetes, compared with 9.5% of those without. The study also revealed links to lower risk of hypertension, congestive heart failure, and coronary artery disease. Surprisingly, among obese people who have brown fat, the prevalence of heart and metabolic conditions was similar to that of non-obese people. “It almost seems like they are protected from the harmful effects of white fat,” said lead researcher Paul Cohen of Rockefeller University.