Posts Tagged ‘obesity causes’

Tracking Obesity into Cellular Mitochondria

February 15, 2024 — Science has come a long way from simplistic assumptions about fat tissue as some sort of fuel depot for the excess calories a person consumes. In fact, adipose tissue is a very active endocrine organ that regulates the use and storage of energy in ways that new research is explaining. At a cellular level, new […]

Disease Burden from Exposure to the Chemicals of Plastics

January 24, 2024 — Scientific publications keep sending us signals that all of the plastic we are heaping into our lives may be eating away at our health. Just this month alone, two new publications have us thinking about the disease burden that may result from exposure to the chemicals of plastics. One, in the Journal of the Endocrine […]

Should We Care That We’re Drinking Nanoplastics?

January 13, 2024 — A new study this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science tells us that every bottle of water we’re drinking has hundreds of thousands of nanoplastics. Should we care? A Blank Slate, Tough to Study This study is important simply because it fills a void in knowledge about how much these nanoplastics are […]

Food Noise: All in the Ears of the Listener?

January 6, 2024 — We are hearing a cacophony lately – lots of noise about food noise. Part of what we hear is a celebration. Some people are finding blessed relief from it when they take advanced medicines for obesity like semaglutide or tirzepatide. Others see a threat in the relief that those people are finding. They deny that […]

Is Obesity Causing Us Stress or Is Stress Causing Obesity?

December 31, 2023 — “We have found a way to soothe the pain of living in this society by stimulating the reward pathway with unhealthy foods just as people do with alcohol and drugs.” This blunt obserservation landed in our inbox with a thud from obesity scientist and clinician Caroline Apovian last week. A counterbalance to the optimistic talk […]

A Lifetime of Endocrine Disruptors and Obesity

November 7, 2023 — A lifetime of exposure to endocrine disruptors can begin before a person is even born, and may put that person on a path to obesity and health complications. This is the implication of a new study in Environmental Health Perspectives. First author Parisa Montazeri explains: “Our findings underscore the potential impact of early-life chemical exposures […]

Headlines Say Fructose Drives Obesity. Research Doesn’t.

October 26, 2023 — It’s like some kind of holy grail. Obesity prevalence keeps rising and everyone (including ourselves) wants to know why. So headlines saying “major study claims to identify the root cause of obesity” really do grab our attention. News reports are pelting us with headlines saying fructose drives obesity. The only trouble is, the headlines are […]

Why Do Our Pets Seem to Be Growing Larger with Us?

October 11, 2023 — Today is World Pet Obesity Awareness Day. So what can we make of the observation that our pets seem to be growing larger with us? We have the privilege of knowing two persons who have put much thought into this subject. So today, we will borrow on their insights. Chihuahua in the Coalmine Ernie Ward […]

Obesity: The Importance of Separating Conjecture from Knowing

September 28, 2023 — “Conjecture is good, but knowing is better.” This bit of wisdom from the Indiana University School of Public Health came to mind yesterday at the Roundtable on Obesity Solutions, hosted by the National Academy of Sciences. The subject of the day was the relationship between culture and obesity – really quite a fascinating subject. Four […]

The Long Arc of Obesity Prevalence

September 16, 2023 — The question that fuels much curiosity about obesity seems simple enough. What is it that sparked an increase in the prevalence of obesity beginning in the 1980s? But a new paper in Science Advances suggests this may altogether be the wrong question. That’s because Mads Møller Pedersen, Claus Thorn Ekstrøm, and Thorkild I.A. Sørensen have […]