The effect of diet on the development of the adipose organ.

The possibility that an infant’s diet may influence the later development of obesity or of atheroma gives this subject its interest and importance. The concept of the body’s depot fat as constituting an ‘organ’ is probably a useful one, but only so long as it does not lead to unwarranted simplification. For instance, samples of depot fat taken from the adipose tissue of a baby’s buttock tend to have larger fat cells than those from the abdominal wall, so that we must be cautious before assuming that single fat samples are rcpresentative of all depot fat. Chemical composition. The lipid laid down in the depot fat of a mammal generally reflects the chemical constitution of the fats fed to it, and this applies equally in the human species. Fig. I illustrates how the fatty acid composition of the triglyccride of the baby’s adipose tissue is determined by the type of fat in the milk it receives.