Micro Diet

After a year’s various indulgences, some of us will make resolutions to exercise more. This not only burns off calories, but also fuels the body’s capacity to keep weight under control, in part by boosting microRNAs – small strands of genetic material that can promote energy use. An alternative way to trigger this process might help people accomplish their weight-loss goals. A new study has looked at how enoxacin – an antibiotic rarely used any more – can encourage metabolism in cells and hence keep weight down. In experiments with mice, it caused microRNAs to make obesity-promoting white fat (which stores surplus energy as fat) behave like brown fat (which turns food to heat), and increased energy expenditure in cells (enoxacin-stimulated fat cells pictured). Enhancing our body’s natural ability to prevent obesity could help tackle a growing health problem, and maybe make next year’s indulgences a little less costly.

Written by Anthony Lewis

Anthony Lewis

Writer

Ant was the web editor in the early days of BPoD, and has since worked with the UK’s top science organisations as a writer and multimedia producer. He now splits his time between freelance work and managing multimedia at The Lancet.

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• Image from work by Andréa Livia Rocha and colleagues
• Department of Biochemistry and Tissue Biology, Institute of Biology, University of Campinas, Campinas, Brazil
• Image copyright held by the original authors
• Research published in Science Advances, December 2020