Brown Seaweed May Be a Fat Fighter

[Celebration]

http://www.forbes.com/forbeslife/health/feeds/hscout/2006/09/11/hscout534849.html

That tasty miso soup you had for lunch may be more than delicious --it could help you burn away excess fat.

That's the conclusion of preliminary research presented Monday at the American Chemical Society's annual meeting, in San Francisco.

Researchers led by Kazuo Miyashita, a chemistry professor at the Hokkaido University Graduate School of Fisheries Sciences in Japan, investigated the effects of brown seaweed, Undaria pinnatifida -- a type of kelp called wakame that is widely consumed in Japan.

They found that fucoxanthin, the brown pigment in the seaweed, promoted a 5 percent to 10 percent weight loss in mice and rats by shrinking abdominal fat. The compound appeared to stimulate a protein that causes fat oxidation and conversion of energy to heat. This protein is found in white adipose tissue -- belly fat -- and that means fucoxanthin might be particularly effective at shrinking oversized guts, the researchers hypothesized.

[patrice]

1. Thanks for the tip!

I don't like the changes menopause wrought in my body!