How a High-Fat Diet and Estrogen Loss Leads Women to Store More Abdominal Fat Than Men
Date: 7.9.2012
A high-fat diet triggers chemical reactions in female mice that could explain why women are more likely than men to gain fat in the abdomen after eating excess saturated fat, new research suggests. The study also sheds light on why women gain fat following menopause.
Scientists identified events in female mice that start with the activation of an enzyme and end with the formation of visceral fat -- fat that accumulates around internal organs and is linked to a higher risk for Type 2 diabetes, heart disease and cancer.
At least one function for this enzyme is the production of a powerful hormone, which then drives up the formation of visceral fat cells. The source of this hormone is vitamin A.
This enzyme appears to be activated at higher levels in females than in males when both sexes eat a high-fat diet. Researchers also studied fat tissue from human surgery patients and found the same enzyme was present in human tissue, and its levels were markedly higher in cells extracted from the visceral fat tissue of obese women compared to cells from lean women.
Finally, the study suggested that estrogen suppresses the enzyme's activity, which might help explain why postmenopausal women with decreased estrogen in their bodies tend to accumulate fat in their bellies.
