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doi: 10.1146/annurev.pharmtox.44.101802.121659 Stedman Center for Nutritional Studies, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina 27710; email: robid001@mc.duke.edu, tlm6@duke.edu, colli008@mc.duke.edu cludes three sibling specialized process of nonshivering thermogenesis in brown adipose tissue. The two types of fat cells that compose adipose tissue, brown and white, are structurally and functionally distinct. Studies on the mechanisms by which individual involved in processes traditionally ascribed to adenylyl cyclase/cAMP/protein kinase A system. They illustrate how knowledge about the physiology and molecular biology of the "adipose organ." Among the newly recognized functions, adipose tissue is now appreciated to be a bona fide endocrine organ capable of secreting a plethora of biologically active substances with local and/or systemic actions (17). Prehaps the first and most important event in this new era of adipocyte biology was the positional cloning of the ob locus encoding a protein now called leptin (8), the long-sought lipostatic factor postulated 50 years ago by Kennedy (9) and supported biochemically by the elegant parabiosis experiments of Coleman (10). Expressed in adipose tissue, leptin is a genuine adiposity signal, whose pleiotropic effects include decreasing appetite and increasing energy expenditure through neuroendocrine action in the central nervous system (reviewed in References 11, 12). Another exciting new fat cellderived factor is the adipocyte complement-related protein of 30 kDa (Acrp30)/adipoQ/adiponectin (1315), which appears, provisionally, to possess insulin sensitizing activity. With these few examples there is a growing list of |
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