{"id":139878,"date":"2021-04-21T13:37:44","date_gmt":"2021-04-21T23:37:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=139878"},"modified":"2021-04-21T13:41:42","modified_gmt":"2021-04-21T23:41:42","slug":"anti-obesity-therapy-closer-to-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2021\/04\/21\/anti-obesity-therapy-closer-to-development\/","title":{"rendered":"Anti-obesity therapy closer to development"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading time: <\/span> 2<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>
\"male
Qing Li<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Obesity is one of the most serious public health issues of the 21st century. More than 600 million adults and 100 million children in 200 countries are considered obese.<\/p>\n

There are very few safe pharmaceutical interventions, but in a new study from the University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> at M\u0101noa College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources (CTAHR<\/abbr> ) Department of Molecular Biosciences and Bioengineering<\/a> (MBBE<\/abbr>), researchers have taken a small yet solid step toward developing a natural supplement that could reduce obesity.<\/p>\n

In the world of natural products, dihydromyricetin (DHM<\/abbr> ), also called ampelopsin, is known to exert antidiabetic effects. However, the biochemical target of this isolate from the herbal plant Ampelopsis grossedentata<\/em> is unknown. For this study, the primary goal of principal investigator and MBBE<\/abbr> Professor Qing Li<\/strong> was to identify that biochemical target.<\/p>\n

The team, which included C.Y. Hu<\/strong> of the Department of Human Nutrition, Food and Animal Sciences<\/a>, as well as several MBBE<\/abbr> students and visiting scholars to CTAHR<\/abbr>, found that the chemical DHM<\/abbr> can reduce lipid droplet formation in adipocytes (cells specialized for the storage of fat, found in connective tissue). They also found DHM<\/abbr> has direct interaction with a protein called “78-kDa glucose-regulated protein” (GRP78<\/abbr>)\u2014the object of their search.<\/p>\n

“It was crucial to identify the biochemical target of DHM<\/abbr>, and show how DHM<\/abbr> is able to reduce lipid droplet formation in 3T3-L1 cells through a mode of action that is plausibly associated with direct interactions between GRP78<\/abbr> and DHM<\/abbr>,” said Li. “Now we can elucidate GRP78<\/abbr>\u2019s physiological function and therapeutic value.”<\/p>\n

He added, “It is quite exciting because the work shows how ampelopsin works as an anti-obesity agent, and is a step forward in determining potential applications of DHM<\/abbr> as an anti-obesity agent. This study brings us a step closer to further development of this natural supplement in the clinical setting for combating obesity.”<\/p>\n

The full study appears in The Journal of Nutrition<\/em>.<\/a><\/p>\n

This work is an example of UH<\/abbr> M\u0101noa\u2019s goal of Excellence in Research: Advancing the Research and Creative Work Enterprise<\/a> (PDF<\/abbr><\/span>), one of four goals identified in the 2015–25 Â鶹´«Ã½<\/a> (PDF<\/abbr><\/span>), updated in December 2020.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The team includes researchers, Qing Li and C.Y. Hu, from the College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[212,165,1485,1467,1363,1010,158,9],"class_list":["post-139878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research","tag-college-of-tropical-agriculture-and-human-resilience","tag-health","tag-human-nutrition-food-and-animal-sciences","tag-manoa-excellence-in-research","tag-manoa-research","tag-molecular-biosciences-and-bioengineering","tag-publication","tag-uh-manoa","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139878"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139878\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":139939,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139878\/revisions\/139939"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}