Adiponectin: The Little Hormone That Could?

Written by James Gormley, Natural Products Industry Writer

How We Can Help Our Body’s Fat Hormones Do What They’re Supposed To Do

Highlights:

What was the frenzy of 2012 that adiponectin was swept up in?
What was the leptin craze of the 1990s?
The skinny on fat
Leptin: Wonder kid?
Resistin: A big fat pain
Adiponectin: The power and the promise
Can we boost adiponectin with diet?

It seems like all of America was swept up in the raspberry ketones and weight loss craze that started in early 2012 when weird-sounding words like “adiponectin” were actually springing up in everyday conversation and on TV shows like Dr. Oz.

But plant-based ketones are not newbies in our food supply, though, since they were called safe food additives by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) way back in the 1960s.

In fact, there are hundreds of other plant compounds that are known to help with weight loss, including soy, but more on that in a minute...

And before we dig into “adiponectin,” let’s first take a look at our fat hormones and what they do.

The Skinny on Fat

Once upon a time, scientists thought that fat (also called adipose) tissue was just fat ... stuff that cushions and insulates the body and which stores energy.

End of story? Not by a long shot.

In fact, all of our fat tissue body makes up one super-important endocrine organ that carries out vital command-and-control functions for metabolism and energy throughout the body.

Along with fat cells, adipose tissue is packed with nerve cells and blood vessels.

It’s constantly storing and releasing energy to power the body by releasing hormones according to what our systems need at any given time.

Three of the hormones released and controlled by fat include leptin, resistin, and adiponectin.

Yet as important as these (and other) fat hormones are, they were only discovered fairly recently: leptin and adiponectin in the mid-1990s and resistin in 2001.

Leptin: Wonder Kid?

In the original animal research on leptin after it was discovered in the mid-1990s, scientists thought they had discovered the cure for obesity.

They thought this because when they injected leptin into mice, they realized that the mice were much less hungry and a lot more trim.

But the main study in humans—the one that had people injecting themselves with leptin—was a complete failure from a weight-loss standpoint.

And the pharmaceutical company that developed this leptin “drug,” and sponsored the research, had to take its marbles and go home.

Today, we know leptin doesn’t affect food intake and appetite from meal to meal but, instead, acts as one of the body’s controllers of how much food we eat and how much (or little) fat we burn over the long haul.

Leptin has a dramatic effect when we lose weight and levels of the hormone plummet. But this brings on hunger and increased food intake.

Essentially this hormone helps us maintain what our body believes is our normal weight, but that’s the problem.

For dieters, leptin can actually make it much harder to lose those extra inches.

We already know that people who are obese usually have very high levels of leptin.

This is because the brain doesn’t respond to leptin after a while, so these folks keep eating even though they have enough (or too much) fat already stored, a problem known as “leptin resistance.”

This causes fat cells to produce even more and more leptin that isn‘t able to communicate with the brain.

So these leptin-resistant people keep eating and eating but always feel hungry.

This is similar to the way people with metabolic syndrome, pre-diabetes or type 2 diabetes have high levels of insulin and blood sugar.

These things keep building up because insulin isn’t able to act as the key that allows sugar to enter cells where it’s needed.

Resistin: A Big Fat Pain

While every hormone and compound produced by the body has a purpose, resistin is most likely a negative-feedback mechanism, something that causes an opposite or seemingly “bad” effect in order to put the brakes on “good” effects so that they don’t get out of control.

Resistin’s effects might have evolved from a time in human’s past when we had sparse nutritional resources or reserves that needed to be preserved in lean times.

But the bottom line for humans today is that resistin is a bad boy, and there's no getting around that.

Like a loose cannon, it increases insulin resistance, interferes with our burning sugar for energy, and serves as a welcome wagon for obesity to lead us on the path to type 2 diabetes.

Fortunately, a good diet—one low in poor-quality fats—can help the body block this hormone’s unhealthy effects.

Adiponectin: The Power and the Promise

Adiponectin, though, is a different story.

Just like leptin, adiponectin is also released by fat (adipose) tissue.

The body uses adiponectin to regulate the metabolism of sugar and fat, for both energy and weight loss.

However, low levels of adiponectin are often associated with obesity.

Even though adiponectin is produced by fat cells, obese people generally have much lower levels of adiponectin than do lean people.

Adiponectin also has anti-inflammatory effects and has been shown to help the body fend off insulin resistance—including metabolic syndrome and type 2 diabetes—and heart disease.

Can We Boost Adiponectin With Diet?

The answer to this million-dollar question is a resounding “yes”!

A number of studies have proven that adding soy protein to the diet reduces body weight, drops insulin resistance, lowers body fat and lessens levels of excess blood fats.

Protein boosts hormones that work to burn fat and help control appetite by making us feel full. In addition, the building blocks of protein, essential amino acids, must be present in order for the body to absorb nutrients from food.

According to Dr. Charles Shively, adiponectin helps stimulate the break-down of fat molecules so the body can use the resulting energy for other metabolic activities.

It also signals the liver to stop making or releasing glucose when blood glucose levels get too high.

Working together, these two activities can increase the body’s sensitivity to insulin.

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Recent research studies have shown one dietary supplement for weight loss and meal replacement—one with vital amino acids—can help the body ensure that we have enough adiponectin when we need it.

This is critical because if we’re getting enough high-quality protein and amino acids through diet and supplementation, we decrease our hunger hormones and increase hormones that make us feel full.

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