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Virginia Tech drug researcher develops 'fat burning' molecule that has implications for treatment of obesity (Science Daily)
"Obesity is the biggest health problem in the United States. But, it is hard for people to lose weight and keep it off; being on a diet can be so difficult. So, a pharmacological approach, or a drug, could help out and would be beneficial for all of society," said Webster Santos, professor of chemistry and the Cliff and Agnes Lilly Faculty Fellow of Drug Discovery in the College of Science at Virginia Tech.
Santos and his colleagues have recently identified a small mitochondrial uncoupler, named BAM15, that decreases the body fat mass of mice without affecting food intake and muscle mass or increasing body temperature. Additionally, the molecule decreases insulin resistance and has beneficial effects on oxidative stress and inflammation.
The findings, published in Nature Communications on May 14, 2020, hold promise for future treatment and prevention of obesity, diabetes, and especially nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), a type of fatty liver disease that is characterized by inflammation and fat accumulation in the liver. In the next few years, the condition is expected to become the leading cause of liver transplants in the United States.
Mitochondrial uncoupler BAM15 reverses diet-induced obesity and insulin resistance in mice (open, DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-16298-2) (DX)
Mitochondrial uncoupler BAM15 inhibits artery constriction and potently activates AMPK in vascular smooth muscle cells (open, DOI: 10.1016/j.apsb.2018.07.010) (DX)
BAM15‐mediated mitochondrial uncoupling protects against obesity and improves glycemic control (open, DOI: 10.15252/emmm.202012088) (DX)
(Score: 4, Interesting) by SlimmPickens on Saturday June 13 2020, @02:36PM (3 children)
I can't remember anything about BAM15 but it sounds familiar. I have all sorts of endocrine problems including insulin resistance and problems with the hunger related leptin and ghrellin signalling proteins. I can be so full I can't fit more food in my stomach and yet still be hungry. I know this from experience, seeing an endocrinologist and inputting my 23andme data to promethease and Rhonda Patrick's tool.
I have learned to make food that I love, never be hungry and loose weight consistently without excersise. Following are some of the key pieces of enabling information.
- The key to avoiding hunger is to avoid falling blood sugar. If it drops, you will get hungry just as sure as the sun is coming up tomorrow.
- You only really absorb carbs in the first 45cm of your gut. Most things that get past will be fermented. The colostridium family for example make butyrate, the basis for the most important ketone, beta-hydroxy-butyrate. Ketones are anti-inflamatory and anti-catabolic signalling molecules and heavily associated with Alzheimer’s prevention (Dr. Dale Bredesen), among other things (Dom Dágostino). Ketosis is about low energy vegetables and fermentation, not bacon and coconut oil. Paradoxically low-carb diets are associated with low butyrate production.
- Anything above 1.5g/Kg/Day of protein will turn into blood sugar. We used to think the excess was urinated but that makes no sense and comes from the days of poor insulin testing. The longievity crowd are saying 0.8g/Kg/D to avoid triggering mtor, which is associated with muscle growth when triggered and longievity when not. 0.8 is not much, 120 grams of chicken breast is the whole day's protein budget for a 50 Kg person.
- Resistant starch doesn't really get absorbed by humans. You can buy it in a bag but all you have to do is cook, cool then reheat the starchy thing and it messes up the starch granules.
- Fermenting is the best thing ever. It looks like we evolved to depend on lacobacilli et al. If you ferment most things you eat then all the short sugars will be gone and the rest gets past that 45cm. The Noma book of fermentation is the #1 resource here. I draw out the rising of my bread for 36 hours (roughly 0.5% low-acidity starter, 2.5% salt and 18-20°C [the pathogens are all too slow with the salt, acid and wheat enzymes]) which allows autolysis to occur, gives more time for the culture proteases and amylases and sets the stage for a lot of umami. This bread can keep me feeling full for many hours.
- Balanced omega 3/6 (eat meat and dairy from animals eating thier natural diet, avoid seed oils) and a high phospholipid intake (bird eggs, fish eggs, sardines and other oily fish) are anti-inflammatory
- Sulforaphane from crucifereous vegetables is also anti-inflammatory, heavily associated with longievity and has other handy properties
Of course, I haven't been checking my RSS for a while and you may have discussed much of this. I hope it helps someone though.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday June 13 2020, @03:02PM (2 children)
Those guidelines are interesting, but obesity and diabetes are a public health crisis and this compound seems helpful. Anyone can take a pill, while very few people will bother with making their own kimchi, yogurt, sourdough, etc. Much less "draw out the rising of my bread for 36 hours" to optimize "culture proteases and amylases".
What would really pop things off is some sort of wearable or implanted tricorder-level technology that could be used to provide the equivalent of a personal nutritionist and catch any health issues (like diabeetus) at a very early stage. We could do preventative medicine orders of magnitude better with constant monitoring (at a much greater sophistication than Apple Watch) and at some point, nanobots.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Saturday June 13 2020, @03:44PM
This... except, we could already do a lot lot better with what we have now.
Now, labs set reference ranges for blood and other tests using "population" sample sets, they tell your doctor what is or isn't "normal", for the population. What you and your doctor actually need to know is what is normal for you. But generally people only get tests done when they are ill, and are only tested for what the doctor thinks might be making them ill, result? - chronically insufficient information for diagnosis or treatment. Unless you are very very average.
Do every blood test every year, every 6 months or even more often for young kids, for everyone, always, even when they are healthy. Then when people get ill you will have the data to see what their normal is and what has changed - as opposed to merely looking at how different they are from the population normal. Because, lets face it, many of us here will be quite a long way from population normal even without being ill... :-)
The reason this isn't done is primarily cost - but if you ramped demand and volume like this, cost would come down even with current tech, and you would spur development of new cheaper high volume tech. And you'd change medicine, I suggest for the better and forever.
(Score: 2) by SlimmPickens on Saturday June 13 2020, @05:58PM
True, but they shouldn't have to. I say this as a current food science student. It's also something you can do right now. And very tasty. Not saying there's no place for meds though.
We're headed that way, there's plenty of healthy and wealthy people with continuous glucose monitors. I think population-level comparison of anonymised blood data and whole genome sequencing would tremendous for biomedical science. Not exactly a large double blind trial but it would likely save more money than it cost even with current blood testing. Not in the USA but maybe some Scandinavian countries would trust thier government enough.