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Updated: Feb 12, 2026

Isolating Brown Adipocytes from Murine Interscapular Brown Adipose Tissue for Gene and Protein Expression Analysis
Published on: March 12, 2021
What activates thermogenesis when lipid droplet lipolysis is absent in brown adipocytes?
Hyunsu Shin1, Hang Shi2, Bingzhong Xue2
1a Center for Molecular and Translational Medicine, Institute for Biomedical Sciences, Georgia State University , Atlanta , GA , USA.
Abstract:
Cold exposure activates the sympathetic nervous system. It is generally thought that this sympathetic activation induces heat production by stimulating lipolysis of cytosolic lipid droplets (LDs) in brown adipocytes. However, this concept was not examined in vivo due to lack of appropriate animal models. Recently, we and others have demonstrated that LD lipolysis in brown adipocytes is not required for cold-induced nonshivering thermogenesis. Our studies uncovered an essential role of white adipose tissue (WAT) lipolysis in fueling thermogenesis during fasting. In addition, we showed that lipolysis deficiency in brown adipose tissue (BAT) induces WAT browning. This commentary further discusses the significance of our findings and how whole body may be heated up without BAT lipolysis.
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