Can burning excess fat be as easy as exhaling? That’s the
finding of a provocative new study by researchers at the
University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), who transplanted a
fat-burning pathway used by bacteria and plants into mice. The
genetic alterations enabled the animals to convert fat into
carbon dioxide and remain lean while eating the equivalent of a
fast-food diet. The feat, detailed in the current issue of Cell
Metabolism introduces a new approach to combating the growing
obesity problem in humans. Although the proof-of-concept study
is far from being tested in humans, it may point to new
strategies for borrowing biological functions from bacteria and
other species to improve human health. To create the fat-burning
mice, the researchers focused on a metabolic strategy used by
some bacteria and plants called the glyoxylate shunt. James
Liao, a biomolecular-engineering professor at UCLA and a senior
author of the study, says, “This pathway is essential for the
cell to convert fat to sugar” and i