The search for a diet pill It’s not something new. For many years, scientists have been trying to satisfy one of the population’s greatest requests: lose weight without diet or exercise. It should be noted that we are talking about scientists, not religious congregations, so we cannot expect miracles. Well, possibly not religious congregations either. The important thing is that it must be made clear that healthy eating and physical exercise They have many advantages, beyond the simple fact of losing weight. However, in certain cases it can be very useful to accompany it with drugs such as the one just described by a team of scientists from the St. Louis Universityin United States.
Most weight loss drugs available or under investigationare based on the reduced appetite. If the person taking it eats less, obviously, they will lose weight. But this has quite a few disadvantages. On the one hand, one of the most used medications for this objective is semaglutidealso used in the treatment of type 2 diabetes to control glucose levels. The population becomes so obsessed with taking a diet pill that in some places there has been a shortage of this medication, with all that this implies for those who need it most. In addition, they usually have very annoying side effects at the digestive level. For this reason, these scientists have proposed another option that does not target appetite, but rather tricks the body into eating. think what is doing exercise.
It should be noted that this is not the first time that a weight loss pill based on this premise has been proposed, although none have been marketed. This has given very good results in mice, so it is still in its infancy. But it has something very important and that is that it imitates exercise in a way that not only serves to lose weight. It can also increase muscle mass and is even believed to help prevent cardiovascular diseases.
The weight loss drug that tricks the body
This drug, which is not actually a diet pill yet, is a compound called SLU-PP-332. Its effectiveness is based on the fact that, once in the body, it acts on ERRa group of proteins that They are enhanced during exercise.
These are known for many reasons. For example, was recently discovered who are in charge of the pancreas does not digest itself. They have a very important role in the proper functioning of the mitochondria of pancreatic cells. Mitochondria are cellular organelles in which reactions occur that provide energy to the body. Therefore, if these do not function properly, cells must obtain energy in another way. And, in the case of the pancreas, it has been observed that, if ERR is inhibited, it initiates a process of autodigestion. Not recommended, of course.
But that’s not ERR’s only role. It has also been seen that these proteins intervene in the regulation of genes involved in processes such as gluconeogenesis, fatty acid metabolism, oxidative phosphorylation or thermogenesis of brown adipose tissue.
In other words, they intervene in a large number of processes associated especially with glucose and fat metabolism. It is activated during exercise, helping the muscles obtain the energy they need. But also burning fat reserves for more energy
Therefore, if the organism is tricked into making ERR act in the same way as with a training, you can get a very interesting weight loss pill. This is the hypothesis on which these scientists worked, with very encouraging results.
Only in mice, for now
This study consisted of two steps. Initially, it was verified what happened when the drug was administered to mice with what is considered normal weight. It was seen that his running efficiency greatly improved. Therefore, when exercising, It seemed like they had trained long before.
But what happened if the drug was used with obese mice? In this second part, we worked with two groups of mice. They all received the same diet and performed exactly the same physical activity. The difference is that one of them received the drug twice daily and the other doesn’t.
In this way, it was seen that those who had been treated with SLU-PP-332 They lost 12% of their body weight and gained 10% less fat than the untreated ones. Therefore, not only did his physical condition improve. They also lost weight.
A long journey to the diet pill
It still needs to be scaled up a bit until this drug can be used in humans. It would be very interesting for all types of patients, but especially for old peoplewhich are sometimes a little more resistant to physical exercise.
On the other hand, we must remember that, for the moment, the drug is administered through injectionso it will have to be reformulated to be able to convert it into a diet pill.
In addition, the authors of the research want to check if it could be used to treat heart failure. If this goes ahead it will be a bombshell. But, for now, we cannot imitate the exercise: we have to practice it. Since there will be benefits that no pill can imitate, it is best to create the habit.