In one example, Dr. Tseng's group previously had shown that exposing
precursor white fat cells to a protein known as BMP7 helps to spur the creation of brown fat cells.
In analyses of the cell lines,
precursor white fat cells from two subjects responded strongly to BMP7 but such cells from the other two subjects did not.
Not exact matches
Activating RXR triggered a cascade of changes in muscle
precursor cells and
white fat that ultimately converted them into brown
fat - like
cells.
Much like chemotherapy's well - known ability to decrease red and
white blood
cell precursors transiently, methotrexate or cyclophosphamide depleted
fat cell precursors, leading to much decreased
fat storage.
Now, however, a team of researchers led by Yu - Hua Tseng, Ph.D., Investigator in the Section on Integrative Physiology and Metabolism at Joslin Diabetes Center and an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, has created
cell lines of human brown and
white fat precursor cells that will help investigators to pick apart the factors that drive the development and activity of each type of
cell.
The
cell lines will allow scientists to study gene expression in
precursor brown
fat and
white fat cells, and in the mature
fat cells these
cells create.
Detection of this CD29 marker eventually may help in selecting
white fat precursor cells that can be transformed for obesity treatments, Dr. Tseng comments.
Another
cell, called a beige
fat cell, is an energy - burning
cell that comes from the same
precursor cell as
white fat cells.
In these early phases, skeletal muscle
cells and
white fat cells have a shared
precursor cell.