Scientists reveal for the first time the neuroimmune process of visceral fat "burning fat"

Obesity can cause a series of health problems, and the most problematic type of obesity is obesity caused by the excessive accumulation of visceral fat.

Excessive visceral fat is very dangerous and difficult to eliminate

The research team of the Champalimaud Research and Diagnostic Center in Portugal decided to explore the mechanism of "natural fat burning", hoping to find potential clinical applications from it

Many people may think that visceral fat is a uniform mass of fat.

One type of immune cell called ILC2 (type 2 natural lymphocytes) caught the attention of this research team

▲How to consume the energy stored in fat cells (picture source: reference [2]; Credit: @dustinhumes_photography)

They found that in visceral fat, the communication between nerve endings and ILC2 requires a key "intermediary": mesenchymal cells

This finding was unexpected, because for a long time, mesenchymal cells were only regarded as "scaffolding" in tissues

A series of experiments pointed out that mesenchymal cells in adipose tissue are like translation.

After confirming this fat-burning mechanism of visceral fat, the research team continued to trace the source to find where the signals from the sympathetic nerve endings came from

Using retrograde tracing technology, surgery, chemical genetics and other operations, the researchers finally confirmed that the paraventricular nucleus (PVH) of the hypothalamus is located at the superior command center of this neural circuit

▲Schematic diagram of neuroimmune process regulating energy consumption of visceral fat (picture source: reference [1])

This discovery further raises many new questions.

Note: The original text has been deleted

Reference materials:

[1] Filipa Cardoso et al.

[2] Scientists decipher how neuro-immune interactions burn deep fat.