The gene that helps the body turn into fat the portion of food that you have just cracked down on your appetite can provide new opportunities for developing methods for treating fatty degeneration of the liver, diabetes and obesity.
Researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, studying the molecular mechanisms that occur in our body when converting dietary carbohydrates to fat, have found that the gene with the catchy name BAF60c promotes the formation of fatty liver disease or fatty hepatosis.
It turned out that in mice in which the BAF60c gene was deactivated, carbohydrates did not turn into fats, despite the fact that the animals were fed with high-carbohydrate food. And in mice, whose BAF60c level was three times higher than normal, fat in the liver accumulated even when they were starving.
According to epidemiological studies, more than three quarters of obese people have fatty hepatosis. Excessive consumption of bread, pasta, rice, carbonated water and other carbohydrates is the main risk factor for the development of fatty liver disease, which is characterized by abnormal accumulation of fat in the liver cells.
In the body, carbohydrates are broken down to glucose, which is a direct source of energy. Excess glucose is deposited in the liver as glycogen, or is converted with the help of insulin to fatty acids, which enter other parts of the body and are deposited there as fat. Excess fatty acids accumulate in the liver.
Scientists advise to exclude refined sugar from the diet, as it quickly increases blood glucose, but pay attention to the fact that there are complex carbohydrates found, for example, in legumes, fruits and vegetables, which should be part of a healthy diet.
But by limiting the consumption of carbonated drinks, cakes and cookies, even on holidays, if we lose anything, then only fat.
