Isolation, Primary Culture, and Differentiation of Preadipocytes from Mouse Brown Adipose Tissue

Evolutionally, brown adipose tissue (BAT) is developed for nonshivering thermogenesis to prevent hypothermia. BAT has a high capacity to dissipate chemical energy generated from metabolism of nutrients for heat production. Therefore when BAT is activated, nutrients are "burned' instead of being stored. This feature makes BAT an attractive target for obesity treatment. To investigate BAT function and regulation, brown adipocyte culturing is indispensable. This chapter describes a detailed protocol for isolation, primary culture, and differentiation of preadipocytes from mouse BAT. The preadipocytes can be used for investigating the regulation of brown fat cell differentiation. The differentiated brown adipocytes maintain major BAT features including high expression of uncoupling protein-1 and can be used to study BAT biology and pharmacology.