SOS for Homo obesus

Conceived originally as merely passive, space-filling, fat storage tissue, studies on adipose tissue biology have enjoyed explosive growth in the last 15 years, the most momentous changes being that of the discovery of leptin by Jeffrey Friedman's laboratory, published on 1 Decem- ber 1944 issue of Nature. Overall, this intellectual grown process framed a novel field of study, adipobiology (1). Ar- guably, in the heart of adipobiology there are studies fo- cusing on the pathogenesis of obesity and related car- diometabolic diseases (CMD) including atherosclerosis, hypertension, type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome and lipodystrophies. In the last 20 years, the physical, mental and economic burden of CMD has reached global pro- portions, Homo obesus being primarily in charge for that burden.