• Question: how many fat cells are in a average body ?

    Asked by emoji to Majid on 7 Mar 2016.
    • Photo: Majid Ahmed

      Majid Ahmed answered on 7 Mar 2016:

      This is a tough one. In the average human body there are probably hundreds of thousands of fat cells (but remember that most cells are tiny). But the actual figure will vary depending on the body fat content – so if a person is obese they may have a million or more fat cells. In obesity the fat cells are a lot bigger as well.

      One interesting fact – the number of bacteria in your body and on your skin outnumber the entire number of cells in your body. But the bacteria are not usually harmful – they thrive of us and they help us to live a healthy life.

Comments

  • Photo: Charlotte

    Charlotte commented on :

    Just to add to Majid’s comment….it is likely that the number of fat cells you have is set during childhood and that when you are an adult if you put on weight the number of fat cells stays the same and instead they just get bigger (or fatter). This has led to the spill-over hypothesis that states that once the capacity of the fat cell is reached the remaining fat “spills-over” to other tissues.

  • Photo: Majid

    Majid commented on :

    Hi Charlotte.

    I agree with you to an extent. But my intuition would tell me that whilst genetics will definitely play a part in setting the persons natural level of fat cells, it will also be affected by environmental/lifestyle as well.

    In all honesty, I would have to do a lot of reading looking at research that has used good reliable experiments to find out how the number of fat cells changes over a person’s life (if this has been done). Maybe I can look into it more.

    Good question @537fate52. Thank you.

  • Photo: Charlotte

    Charlotte commented on :

    Oh I like that this has caused some debate 🙂 I think this is the most recent nature paper on the subject http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v453/n7196/full/nature06902.html

    Although the number is set in childhood the cells do turn over so of course there is a chance for environment to play a role. 🙂

  • Photo: Charlotte

    Charlotte commented on :

    Me again lol so I have spoken to my friend who works in this are…we have two fat depots one on our bum and one in our tummy. The fat cells in tum get bigger during obesity whereas bum fat (thought to be healthy fat) can increase in number 🙂 so yuou can see how complicated answers to questions can be and how clever our bodies are 🙂

  • Photo: Majid

    Majid commented on :

    Thanks Charlotte for the update. Intriguing!!!

    I think there are more than 2 fat depots though. For white adipose tissue, there is subcutaneous fat (beneath the skin) and visceral fat (surrounding many organs – for example – epicardial/pericardial fat surrounding the heart). There are also reports of intramuscular fat (in or surrounding the muscles).

    Also, brown adipose depots can be found in the supraclavicular (above the clavicles) and in the subscapular region (below the scapula bone on the back).

    Here is a review I found quickly which goes into more detail:
    http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2011/490650

    Don’t you just love research?