All About Body Fat

With a significant portion of the population carry to much body fat weight loss is a common topic. People want to know how they can lose body fat, prevent themselves from gaining body fat and how to keep this body fat off forever. Learning what exactly this tissue is will be a step in the right direction to reaching this goal.

Body fat is a tissue that is needed by the body for a wide variety of functions such as temperature regulation, proper reproductive capabilities (particularly in women), shock absorption, the regulation of other nutrients and to maintain healthy skin, hair and nails. The amount of required body fat for the body to stay living (essential body fat) is around 3% for men and 9% for women. Going below these percentages and you will be asking for problems to occur. Generally men tend to put body fat on in the areas of their stomach while women tend to store body fat on their buttocks, hips and upper arms.

The type of body fat that is most often seen in adults is called white fat. White fat is important for energy metabolism, heat insulation and cushioning of the bones and organs. The white fat cells that make up this fat are composed largely of a single fat molecule and then a very small nucleus and a little bit of cyctoplasm. Additional, it is subcutaneous fat that you normally see on a person as this is the body fat that lies right under the skin.

It should be noted here too that after you have developed all your body fat cells, normally around the teenage years, you will never add any additional fat cells, they will only become larger as more fat is added to each cell.

When you consume food that has fat, the triglycerides enter into the blood stream and get taken to the intestines. There they get mixed with bile salts from the gall bladder and then form smaller molecules called micelles. Next the pancreas secretes enzymes that are called lipases that then target the micelles, breaking them down into their counterparts of glycerol and fatty acids. These new molecules then get absorbed back into the intestine and are reassembled together in a protein lined package called a chylomicron. These are then released into the lymphatic system leading to your veins and then into the blood stream.

Now that they have entered into the bloodstream, the next process is to be stored in the body as body fat. These chylomicrons stay in the bloodstream for a short time and then lipoprotein lipase breaks these fat molecules into fatty acids once again. Whether or not these enzymes are present to break the fat molecules down however depends on yet another substance, insulin. Insulin is a polypeptide hormone that is secreted from the pancreas that helps to regulate the metabolism of carbohydrates and fats. When you eat rapidly digesting carbohydrates, insulin has a tendency to sharply increase and when you eat slower digesting carbohydrates along with complete sources of protein and fat then insulin levels stay more stable.

Once the lipases have turned the fat molecules back into fatty acids they are then absorbed from the blood into your fat cells, thus causing you to gain body fat.

Maintaining good health through a proper exercise program and diet, one that contains moderate amounts of healthy fats, slow digesting carbohydrates and lean sources of protein is your best bet to fend off diseases. Now that you understand what happens when you eat foods that are high in simple carbohydrates or fat it may be easier to say no to them and choose a much more nutrition alternative.