Drugs for weight loss

[Neil9327]

The normal wisdom is that it is not possible to take drugs to lose weight and that exercise is the only way to burn fat.

 

But surely this cant be right. My question is what is the direct cause of fat to be burned up. I dont think it is messages from the nervous system to the fat cells to say burn up. It must be the presence or absense of some chemicals or hormones in the blood stream. Perhaps the presence of ADP.

 

So why not hook up fat people to dialysys machines overnight for a number of weeks and get these to add/remove the offending chemicals from their bloodstream as they sleep and they will get slim

[mattbimbo]

or give them a blood donation from a thin person perhaps?

[Neil9327]

or give them a blood donation from a thin person perhaps?

I mean it is ONGOING presence or absence of these chemicals in the blood that would be the key thing. Yes you could give them the blood of a thin person but this would only temporarily fix the problem until whatever factors causing the weight gain reassert themselves in terms of what is in their blood.

[neo007]

The normal wisdom is that it is not possible to take drugs to lose weight and that exercise is the only way to burn fat.

 

Exercise is not the only way to burn fat. In morbidly obese patients a radical procedure called gastroplasty, or "stomach stapling", is used as treatment.

[JustStuit]

Exercise is not the only way to burn fat. In morbidly obese patients a radical procedure called gastroplasty, or "stomach stapling", is used as treatment.

That doesn't burn fat, it just limits the food intake of patients. Less food = more weight loss.

[neo007]

Not directly...but surely less food intake means that the body needs more energy to be burned to maintain metabolism?

[Sisyphus]

Burning fat produces energy. If you don't use energy, you don't burn fat. Drugs could increase your metabolism, which would make your body expend more energy just to survive, but obviously this can only be done to a limited degree, and it's much more effective to actually use energy for real, through exercise. Drugs can also reduce appetite, or hinder digestion, both of which take the approach of denying the body new energy sources, forcing it to burn its reserves (fat). Surgical approaches like gastric bipasses are also along these lines.

[JustStuit]

Not directly...but surely less food intake means that the body needs more energy to be burned to maintain metabolism?

Indirectly sure. But not eating high calorie/fat foods or smaller portions would produce the same effect. Or just exercising.

[Neil9327]

Burning fat produces energy. If you don't use energy, you don't burn fat. Drugs could increase your metabolism, which would make your body expend more energy just to survive, but obviously this can only be done to a limited degree, and it's much more effective to actually use energy for real, through exercise. Drugs can also reduce appetite, or hinder digestion, both of which take the approach of denying the body new energy sources, forcing it to burn its reserves (fat). Surgical approaches like gastric bipasses are also along these lines.

 

So perhaps if you were to artificially "use energy for real" with my idea of taking blood through dialysis and removing the energy from it would work?

 

BTW When I wrote this post, I didn't get any replies to it, so I thought the title "drugs for weight loss" was not a good title. So I reposted it under the bichemistry section:

 

http://www.scienceforums.net/forums/showthread.php?t=20057

 

and there are around 5 posts there also. Have a read if you like.

[Sisyphus]

No, that wouldn't work.

[Neil9327]

No, that wouldn't work.

Why not?

[neo007]

Why not?

 

Clinically its not practical, and as far as i know it isn't used for weight loss. Dialysis would only temporarily have an effect, and i doubt it will result in significant weight loss. I would think that the body's homeostatic mechanism would kick in to counter-act the dialysis in some way.

 

However combined with some other treatment, possibly liposuction or stomach stapling then mayb dialysis would perhaps be slightly useful. But even still, i think the effects would vary from person to person. Also i don't think dialysis would be economically feasible to treat patients with weight problems, surely dialysis should be carried out on patients that actually need it, such as those with kidney problems.

[Mercurial]

I'm enjoying the thought experiment here so I'm gonna go ahead and throw an idea in here which completely has no background, but it seems to me that you need to get away from the idea of filtering out ADP/ATP from the blood system for 2 reasons: 1) it's not likely you're going to have much of that directly in the blood stream it stays in the cell for the most part and 2) it's pretty essential for normal function and you don't want to be removing it in either it's activated (ATP) or unactivated (ADP) form.

 

I remember in your last thread someone mentioned that dialysis is expensive and also tends to be less effective in removing larger molecules vs. smaller ones. As I have no idea how a dialysis machine works so I have no authority to say this would work or not but it seems whatever does this filtering could be modified to be selective for fatty acids using their amphoteric properties to selectively bind them. Unfortunately, proteins can also have these amphoteric properties so your column (?) resin would have to be selective for lipid vs. protein. Then to make this effective it seems like you would have to stimulate fat release from adipose tissue... this is getting more and mroe complicated and well out of my actual knowledge of any of this but I guess it's jsut soe stuff to think about. In short, good luck!

[Neil9327]

I'm enjoying the thought experiment here so I'm gonna go ahead and throw an idea in here which completely has no background' date=' but it seems to me that you need to get away from the idea of filtering out ADP/ATP from the blood system for 2 reasons: 1) it's not likely you're going to have much of that directly in the blood stream it stays in the cell for the most part and 2) it's pretty essential for normal function and you don't want to be removing it in either it's activated (ATP) or unactivated (ADP) form.

 

I remember in your last thread someone mentioned that dialysis is expensive and also tends to be less effective in removing larger molecules vs. smaller ones. As I have no idea how a dialysis machine works so I have no authority to say this would work or not but it seems whatever does this filtering could be modified to be selective for fatty acids using their amphoteric properties to selectively bind them. Unfortunately, proteins can also have these amphoteric properties so your column (?) resin would have to be selective for lipid vs. protein. Then to make this effective it seems like you would have to stimulate fat release from adipose tissue... this is getting more and mroe complicated and well out of my actual knowledge of any of this but I guess it's jsut soe stuff to think about. In short, good luck! [/quote']

 

Yes OK my ADP/ATP ideas are perhaps a red herring. But I was talking to my friends down the curry house a couple of days ago and one of them said they watched a program on the discovery channel that said that scientists were very close to getting a drug that can cause fat to be burned up. My brother recons that it would make them billions. He also said that he thought that enzymes in combination with low blood sugar would cause fat to burn. So how about putting our fat friends on to dialysis over night, and initially after they go to sleep removing much of the sugar from their blood stream. Then the body to compensate would have to cause fat to burn to release more sugar. Then before the person wakes up in the morning the dialysis process adds sugar back so they don't feel tired.

I agree with the sentiments that it would be expensive. Very.

Thanks for the good luck. I won't give up my day job just yet

 

Are there any "serious" biochemistry forums on the internet I could put this question to?. I don't mean to be derogaory about scienceforums.net but this is for amateurs like me.

[scicop]

Why do you think its not possible to take a drug to help lose weight?

 

The FDA has given an approvable letter to Sanofi-Aventis for rimonabant (SRI41716A), the CB1 cannabinoid receptor antagonist (really an inverse agonist) for weight-loss (although they received a non-approvealbe letter for smoking cessation).

 

This was based on the 2 year long phase III clinical trial showed that when compared to placebo obese patients on varying doses of rimonabont (in combination with diet and excercise) lost weight. After a year a group on rimonabant was randomized into either placebo or rimonabant. The group on rimonabant maintained their weight-loss, where as the placebo group gained weight (Pi-Sunyer et al. JAMA 2006 paper).

 

This is a potiental block-buster drug for Sanofi. Gentlement...start your (investment) engines...if you havent already.

[mattbimbo]

never heard of marilyn munroe? or the many other actresses who were given drugs to reduce weight. very big in the 50s.

[Neil9327]

I looked up Rimonabant on Wikipedia:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rimonabant

 

And it seems to be an appetite suppressor. Will be interesting to see how it does.

 

 

I also looked up "fatty acid metabolism" on wikipedia

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatty_acid_metabolism

 

and the article says "The breakdown of fat stored in fat cells is known as lipolysis"

 

and "The following hormones induce lipolysis: epinephrine, norepinephrine, glucagon and adrenocorticotropic hormone"

 

Then I clicked on "epinephrine" and it turns out that this is a stress hormone.

So on the face of it it would seem you have to be stressed to lose weight. It would explain why people who are worried are often thin, and why fat people are jolly.

 

So the question is, and I know that this is such a simplification, is can you get "epinephrine" into your bloodstream over night without waking you up or causing nightmares?

[mattbimbo]

So the question is, and I know that this is such a simplification, is can you get "epinephrine" into your bloodstream over night without waking you up or causing nightmares?

 

that i seriously doubt.

 

and anyway the breakdown of fat by lipolysis is not the whole story, the fat can then be converted to glucose, known as gluconeogenesis.

 

perhaps you should try reading about futile cycling.

[mattbimbo]

this and this and this should get you started.

[scicop]

I looked up Rimonabant on Wikipedia:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rimonabant

 

And it seems to be an appetite suppressor. Will be interesting to see how it does.

 

 

I also looked up "fatty acid metabolism" on wikipedia

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatty_acid_metabolism

 

and the article says "The breakdown of fat stored in fat cells is known as lipolysis"

 

and "The following hormones induce lipolysis: epinephrine' date=' norepinephrine, glucagon and adrenocorticotropic hormone"

 

Then I clicked on "epinephrine" and it turns out that this is a stress hormone.

So on the face of it it would seem you have to be stressed to lose weight. It would explain why people who are worried are often thin, and why fat people are jolly.

 

So the question is, and I know that this is such a simplification, is can you get "epinephrine" into your bloodstream over night without waking you up or causing nightmares?[/quote']

 

CB1 is involved in fat metabolism, so the remonabant may not only suppress appetite, but it also can block fat absorption.

[Neil9327]

this and this and this[/url'] should get you started.

 

Ooo that's HHEEAAVVYY man