Losing Weight Very Cold

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Over 40% of adult Americans are obese, a complicated condition that raises the risk of diabetes, heart disease, and several types of cancer. By creating low-grade chronic inflammation and the buildup of immune cells in insulin-sensitive tissues, obesity is one factor that can contribute to other health issues. Scientists believe that reversing, or “resolving, ” this chronic inflammation might delay the emergence of obesity-related diseases like diabetes and perhaps make it easier to lose weight.

Researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Joslin Diabetes Center discovered that in diet-induced obese mice, exposure to cold temperatures improved insulin sensitivity and glucose tolerance while resolving obesity-induced inflammation. Their findings were reported in a new paper that was published in

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“We discovered that cold exposure reduced inflammation and improved metabolism in obesity, mediated at least in part by the activation of brown adipose tissue.” — Yu-Hua Tseng, Ph.D.

The research team also found that the mechanism was dependent on brown adipose tissue, which is commonly referred to as “good fat, ” releasing a naturally occurring molecule called Maresin 2 in response to cold stimulation. Brown adipose tissue is known as an active endocrine organ because it secretes molecules that communicate with other tissues and manage metabolism. It also aids in the release of stored energy and could promote weight reduction and metabolic health.

“Extensive evidence indicates that obesity and metabolic syndrome are linked with chronic inflammation that leads to systemic insulin resistance, so interrupting inflammation in obesity could offer promising therapies for obesity-related disease, ” said co-corresponding author Yu-Hua Tseng, Ph.D., a senior investigator in the Section on Integrative Physiology and Metabolism at Joslin Diabetes Center and professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.

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“We discovered that cold exposure reduced inflammation and improved metabolism in obesity, mediated at least in part by the activation of brown adipose tissue. These findings suggest a previously unrecognized function of brown adipose tissue in promoting the resolution of inflammation in obesity.”

In two earlier experiments, Tseng and colleagues found that brown fat may be activated by cold exposure to create certain lipid mediators that control nutrient metabolism. In the current study, the researchers identified a novel role for a lipid mediator produced from brown fat to resolve inflammation.

When the animals were exposed to a cold environment (around 40 degrees Fahrenheit), the researchers observed that the animals’ insulin sensitivity and glucose metabolism improved and their body weight decreased, compared to control animals maintained at a thermoneutral zone – the environmental temperature where the body does not need to produce heat for maintaining its core body temperature.

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“We found that brown fat produces Maresin 2, which resolves inflammation systemically and in the liver, ” said co-corresponding author Matthew Spite, Ph.D., a lead investigator at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Associate Professor of Anesthesia at Harvard Medical School. “These findings suggest a previously unrecognized function of brown adipose tissue in promoting the resolution of inflammation in obesity via the production of this important lipid mediator.”

Moreover, these findings also suggest that Maresin 2 could have clinical applications as a therapy for patients with obesity, metabolic disease, or other diseases linked to chronic inflammation; however, the molecule itself breaks down quickly in the body. Tseng and colleagues seek a more stable chemical analog for clinical use.

The team notes a shortcut to improved metabolic health may already exist. Multiple human studies conducted at Joslin and elsewhere show that exposure to mildly cold temperatures (50 to 55 degrees Fahrenheit) has been shown to be sufficient to activate brown adipose tissue and improve metabolism, though the mechanisms are not well understood.

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Reference: “Brown adipose tissue-derived MaR2 contributes to cold-induced resolution of inflammation” by Satoru Sugimoto, Hebe Agustina Mena, Brian E. Sansbury, Shio Kobayashi, Tadataka Tsuji, Chih-Hao Wang, Xuanzhi Yin, Tian Lian Huang, Joji Kusuyama, Sean D. Kodani, Justin Darcy, Gerson Profeta, Nayara Pereira, Rudolph E. Tanzi, Can Zhang, Thomas Serwold, Efi Kokkotou, Laurie J. Goodyear, Aaron M. Cypess, Luiz Osório Leiria, Matthew Spite, and Yu-Hua Tseng, 27 June 2022,

This work was supported in part by US National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants (R01DK122808, R01DK077097, R01DK102898, R01HL106173, R01DK099511, R01DK112283, P30DK0368360) and by US Army Medical Research grant W81XWH-17-1-0428; the Manpei Suzuki Diabetes Foundation in Japan; grant 2019/20554-7 from The São Paulo Research Foundation, FAPESP; an American Diabetes Association post-doctoral fellowship (1-16-PDF-063); the Sao Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) grants 2017/02684 and 2019/26008-4.

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A newstudy published in the Nature journal Scientific Reports has found evidence that exposure to cold temperatures could transform the type of fat we form in our bodies, and even potentially help us burn off excess body fat.

Cold Weather Makes You Lose Weight And Burn More Fat

For the research, scientists differentiated stem cells (which can become other types of cells) to become fat cells at both normal body temperature and at a slightly cooler temperature.They found that at the lower temperatures, the cells formed a kind of fat known as brown fat, which causes bodies to burn more calories to keep warm and burn off excess body fat.

People always have some layer of fat in their bodies. Adults have mostly white fat, which serves as a sort of solid, inert way of storing energy. White fat is what makes up dangerous excess body fat. Brown fat, on the other hand, is used to rev up the metabolism to keep us warm — it's how babies regulate their body temperature, since they don't have the muscles to shiver themselves warm yet.

Researchers once thought we lost this type of fat as we left childhood, but they now know there's at least a small amount left in adults. That realization gave scientists hope that they could figure out how to activate and even stimulate the growth of this brown fat in our bodies, which could help people burn off extra calories — including the white fat many of us have stored around our bellies.

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It has been known for quite some time that exposure to lower temperatures can promote the formation of brown fat, but the mechanism of this has not yet been discovered, study author Virginie Sottile, an associate professor at the University of Nottingham in the UK, said in a statement. The trigger was believed to be the body's nervous system and changes in the way we eat when we are cold. However, our study has shown that even by making fairly modest changes in temperature, we can activate our stem cells to form brown fat at a cellular level.

That finding is promising for three reasons. First, it helps reveal more about the mechanism that causes brown fat to be produced in the cold. Second, it shows that those changes can happen with a difference of a few degrees: In the study, cells turned into brown fat instead of whiteat 89.6 degrees Fahrenheit (32 Celsius) instead of the normal human body temperature of 98.6 degrees (37 Celsius).Third, the research suggests that the production of brown fat can be triggered by environmental change and doesn't rely on special cells that always produce brown fat.

The good news from these results is that our cells are not pre-programmed to form bad fat and our stem cells can respond if we apply the right change in lifestyle, Sottile said.

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This study doesn't tell us how much cold people need