Hiraike Yuta
Laboratory for Advanced Research on Pathophysiology of Metabolic Diseases, Graduate School of Medicine, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-8655, Japan.
J Biochem. 2025 Sep 3;178(3):147-159. doi: 10.1093/jb/mvaf038.
Brown adipocytes dissipate chemical energy as heat and confer protection against type 2 diabetes and obesity. Nuclear factor I-A (NFIA) is a transcription factor that orchestrates the brown fat gene programme by activating cell type-specific enhancers and facilitating the genomic binding of PPARγ, the master regulator of adipogenesis, to these enhancers. NFIA promotes mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation and thermogenesis, while reciprocally suppressing adipose tissue inflammation, thereby contributing to the maintenance of glucose and body weight homeostasis in mice. Here the author provides an overview of the identification of NFIA as a pivotal regulator of brown adipocyte biology, elucidates its underlying mechanisms of action, examines its implications for systemic metabolism and outlines future perspectives for research in this field.
棕色脂肪细胞将化学能以热量形式消耗，并对2型糖尿病和肥胖症起到保护作用。核因子I-A（NFIA）是一种转录因子，它通过激活细胞类型特异性增强子并促进脂肪生成的主要调节因子PPARγ与这些增强子的基因组结合，来协调棕色脂肪基因程序。NFIA促进线粒体氧化磷酸化和产热，同时相互抑制脂肪组织炎症，从而有助于维持小鼠体内的葡萄糖和体重稳态。在此，作者概述了NFIA作为棕色脂肪细胞生物学关键调节因子的鉴定过程，阐明了其潜在的作用机制，探讨了其对全身代谢的影响，并概述了该领域未来的研究前景。
