Link Between Fat Cells and Brain Clock Molecules Shown

In a new study in Nature Medicine shows that the deletion of the clock gene in fat cells caused mice to become obese.  The clock gene is known as Arntl or Bmal1.  The recent findings shed light on the causes of obesity in humans.  The study was conducted by Georgios Paschos PhD, a research associate in the lab of Garret FitzGerald, MD, FRS director of the Institute for Translational Medicine and Therapeutics, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania.  The studies show that food consumption during what is considered the rest period for mice favored energy storage.  This caused the mice to become obese without consuming more calories.  This behavioral change in mice is similar to night-eating syndrome in humans, which is also associated with obesity.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="480" caption="Mice with a broken clock in their fat get fat as they eat when they should be sleeping. (Credit: Georgios Paschos PhD, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania)"][/caption]

When the clock was broken in fat cells, the hypothalamic rhythm was disrupted to favor food consumption at inappropriate times.  This means the mice would get the urge to eat in the daytime when they should be asleep.  The change in daily rhythm caused changes in metabolism.  The Penn team also found a handful of genes that were altered by the broken clock in the fat cells.  Those genes governed how unsaturated fatty acids, such as EPA and DHA were released into the blood stream.  The Penn team found that EPA and DHA levels were low at the time of inappropriate feeding.  Interestingly enough, Paschos states that the team supplemented EPA and DHA to the knockout mice, which "rescued the entire phenotype".  The findings show that show-term changes have an immediate effect on the rhythm of eating.  These changes lead to an increase in body weight.  I really enjoyed this study.  I think it should be brought to the attention of others about the importance of not eating past a certain time.  I know there has been conflicting reports regarding nighttime eating and weight gain.  Some say it doesn't matter when you eat, while we hear sayings like, "Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper" all of the time.  This study seems like it supports the latter opinion.