Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 22, 2026
Decellularization-Based Quantification of Skeletal Muscle Fatty Infiltration
Published on: June 9, 2023
Reciprocal relations of subcutaneous and visceral fat to bone structure and strength
Vicente Gilsanz1, James Chalfant, Ashley O Mo
1Department of Radiology, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California 90027, USA. vgilsanz@chla.usc.edu
Context:
Increased body fat is a risk factor for cardiovascular and metabolic disease, yet it is uncertain whether obesity protects against osteoporosis or adiposity is harmful to bone.
Objective:
The aim of the study was to assess whether the pattern of adipose tissue deposition influences bone structure and strength.
Design:
The relations between sc and visceral adiposity and the cross-sectional dimensions and polar and principal moments of the femur in 100 healthy women ages 15 to 25 years were obtained using computed tomography.
Results:
Multiple linear regression analyses indicated that, after adjusting for leg length and thigh musculature, both sc and visceral fat had strong and independent associations with femoral cross-sectional area, cortical bone area, principal moment maximum, principal moment minimum, and polar moment (all P values < 0.03). However, whereas sc fat had a positive predictive value with all femoral bone phenotypes, a similar but negative effect was observed between visceral fat and these measures (all P values < 0.01).
Conclusions:
We found that visceral and sc fat have opposite effects on the appendicular skeleton; whereas sc fat is beneficial to bone structure and strength, visceral fat serves as an unique pathogenic fat depot.
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