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Metabolism

Targeting a fat-accumulation gene

Nature volume 508, pages 194–195 (2014)Cite this article

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An enzyme that links two metabolic hubs has been found to be upregulated in the fat cells of overweight mice. Inhibition of the gene encoding this enzyme protects mice from diet-induced obesity. See Letter p.258

In recent decades, increased food availability has dramatically altered many people's diets. Each year, billions of tonnes of grain are fed to livestock or converted to ingredients for food. Consumption of the resulting meat, fat and processed carbohydrate by humans, accompanied by a decline in their energy expenditure, has created a nutritional overload that has resulted in increased adiposity and incidence of the resulting diseases worldwide. On page 258 of this issue, Kraus et al.1 identify Nnmt, which encodes the enzyme nicotinamide N-methyltransferase (NNMT), as a gene whose activity is ramped up by nutritional overload, and they find that Nnmt is required for the accumulation of fat.

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Figure 1: Accelerating fat-cell metabolism.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Charles Brenner is in the Department of Biochemistry, the Obesity Research Initiative, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa 52242, USA.,

    Charles Brenner

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  1. Charles Brenner
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Correspondence to Charles Brenner.

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Brenner, C. Targeting a fat-accumulation gene. Nature 508, 194–195 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/508194a

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