Capsaicin, the stuff that gives chilli peppers their kick, may cause weight loss and fight fat build-up by triggering certain beneficial protein changes in the body, says a new study.
The study could potentially open up new treatments for obesity.
Jong Won Yun, biotechnologist from Daegu University, Korea, and colleagues point out that obesity is a major public health threat worldwide, linked to diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease and other health problems.
Lab studies have hinted that capsaicin may help fight obesity by decreasing calorie intake, shrinking fat tissue and lowering fat levels in the blood. Nobody, however, knows exactly how capsaicin might trigger such beneficial effects.
In an effort to find out, the scientists fed high-fat diets with or without capsaicin to lab rats used for the study.
The capsaicin-treated rats lost eight percent of their body weight and showed changes in levels of at least 20 key proteins found in fat, said a release of the American Chemical Society (ACS).
The altered proteins work to break down fats. 'These changes provide valuable new molecular insights into the mechanism of the antiobesity effects of capsaicin,' the scientists say.
These findings appear in the in ACS' monthly Journal of Proteome Research.
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