Boston Researchers Working On ‘Treadmill In A Pill’

BOSTON (CBS) – Losing weight is a very popular New Year’s resolution. And we soon may be able to shed the pounds without the sweat. Boston researchers say they have captured the weight loss benefits of a treadmill in a pill. Professor Chad Cowan and his team at Harvard University and Mass General Hospital have found a drug that can transform some of your “bad” fat into super-charged “good” fat that simply burns itself — like a day at the gym. “When you exercise you very naturally do this to some of the fat cells in your body. So we’re going to sort of make it like you’ve done some rigorous exercise a little bit every day so that you burn off those excess calories,” says Cowan. All of us have so called white fat and a limited amount of brown fat. This breakthrough tricks those white fat cells into acting like those self-burning brown ones. “So now rather than just sitting on the couch it gets up and burns off some of that energy in the form of heat,” explains Cowan. The drug has proven successful in mice but we are still years away from human clinical trials. The hope is that this discovery could be the fuel needed to battle the obesity epidemic. Cowan likes to use a super hero analogy when describing how it works: “It’s not that they forgot they were white fat cells. It’s just like Peter Parker, who is Spiderman, still remembers he is Peter Parker. It’s just now he’s also ...
Source: WBZ-TV - Breaking News, Weather and Sports for Boston, Worcester and New Hampshire - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Health Local News Seen On WBZ-TV Syndicated Local Watch Listen Fat Harvard University Mallika Marshall Mass General Hospital Obesity Workout Source Type: news