Hanging in front of the abdomen like an apron, the depot of visceral fat known as the omentum helps regulate immune responses.

Animals lacking a sense of smell stayed thinner than their smelling counterparts, despite eating the same amount.

Limiting food intake leads to the conversion of white fat cells into more metabolically active brown fat cells through an immune response, a mouse study shows.

In mice lacking intestinal microbiota, white fat turns brown and obesity is prevented.

Assistant Professor, Department of Cell and Tissue Biology, University of California, San Francisco. Age: 39

Bruce Spiegelman has spent his career at the forefront of adipocyte differentiation and metabolism.

Scientists know how to turn on these fat-combusting cells. Can these energy burners be used to combat obesity?

Researchers who first identified irisin quantitate levels of the hormone in human blood and show it is released during exercise.  

Following extreme trauma, patients’ adipose samples have revealed—for the first time in humans—that white fat can be converted into energy-burning brown fat.

Artificially extended days cause mice to gain fat and alter the function of their brown fat, a study shows.

Transplanting energy-burning brown fat can prevent excess weight gain in a mouse model of obesity.

Post-publication peer reviewers had questioned data about the supposed fat-browning enzyme from the get-go.

A small study finds that an approved medication increases metabolic rate and the activity of thermogenic brown fat in men.

Insulin and leptin act on specialized neurons in the mouse hypothalamus to promote conversion of white to beige fat.

A new drug shows promise as a weight-loss solution in mice, prompting the animals to burn calories in the absence of a meal.

See-through organs and animals; distinguishing white from brown and beige fat cells; chipping away at genetic mosaicism; catching up with the blogger behind Street Anatomy

Researchers have identified three fat cell-specific surface markers that distinguish white from brown and beige adipocytes.

Conversion of white fat to brown is associated with muscle atrophy and weight loss in cancer patients.

An innate immune pathway stimulates the activity of heat-producing adipose tissue in mice.