Abstract
The ability to alter the amount and activity of brown adipose tissue (BAT) in human adults is a potential strategy to manage obesity and related metabolic disorders associated with food, drug, and environmental stimuli with BAT activating/recruiting capacity. Infrared thermography (IRT) provides a non-invasive and inexpensive alternative to the current methods (e.g. 18F-FDG PET) used to assess BAT. We have quantified BAT activation in the cervical-supraclavicular (C-SCV) region using IRT video imaging and a novel image computational algorithm by studying C-SCV heat production in healthy young men after cold stimulation and the ingestion of capsinoids in a prospective double-blind placebo-controlled randomized trial. Subjects were divided into low-BAT and high-BAT groups based on changes in IR emissions in the C-SCV region induced by cold. The high-BAT group showed significant increases in energy expenditure, fat oxidation, and heat output in the C-SCV region post-capsinoid ingestion compared to post-placebo ingestion, but the low-BAT group did not. Based on these results, we conclude that IRT is a promising tool for quantifying BAT activity.
Highlights
White adipose tissue (WAT) is the primary site of energy storage in humans, while the function of brown adipose tissue (BAT) is to transfer energy from food into heat, i.e. thermogenesis [1]
Twenty-four subjects were exposed to cold stimulation by immersion of both hands and feet in water maintained at 18 °C, and during this time their C-SCV regions were imaged using Infrared thermography (IRT)
Higher average temperatures were detected in the regions of interest (ROIs) in anterolateral views (Fig. 3a, c, d, f) of the C-SCV regions compared to those in front views (Fig. 3b, e), suggesting that imaging the anterolateral views of the C-SCV could capture more of the heat emanating from BAT
Summary
White adipose tissue (WAT) is the primary site of energy storage in humans, while the function of brown adipose tissue (BAT) is to transfer energy from food into heat, i.e. thermogenesis [1]. BAT refers to both classical brown adipocytes and ‘beige’ adipocytes ( termed ‘brite’ adipocytes or inducible brown adipocytes) [2]. Human BAT depots contain both brown-like and beige-like adipocytes [3, 4], both of which we refer to as BAT in this study. BAT dissipates energy as heat (non-shivering thermogenesis) by uncoupling oxidative phosphorylation, a process that is often stimulated by exposure to cold [5,6,7]. BAT is especially prevalent in newborn babies, functioning as a defense against hypothermia, but its prevalence diminishes greatly with age.
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