What is Human Fat?

[RRR]

From what I have gathered from basic nutrition there are different kinds of fats:

Saturated Fats
Trans Fats
Monounsaturated Fats
Polyunsaturated Fats
Omega 3 Fatty Acids
Omega 6 Fatty Acids
Cholesterol

I have been unable to find on the internet what composes Human body fat. I'm told that Animal Fat (Lard) is primarily Saturated Fats. I am curious if live human tissue is the same as the fat found in cattle and other mammals.

When you burn off your physical fat, is it similar in effect to eating saturated fats? Do your cholestrol levels rise? Are subcutaneous and visceral fat composed of the same material? Does burning body fat alter blood sugar levels? (as is suggested happens when you intake excess fat). Should alterations be made to ones diet if they are currently burning off body fat?

I would like to adopt a raw vegan diet from my current short lived vegan diet. (I have tried both and I can't stand these cooked foods). However, I am unsure how much fat I should take in if I am constantly burning body fat as fuel. Do I risk my only fat intake being saturated? Or is human fat full of the Omegas my brain needs? Thus I beg the question: What is body fat made of?

[Honeywith4bees]

Adipose tissue, or fat, is an anatomical term for loose connective tissue composed of adipocytes.

Its main role is to store energy in the form of fat, although it also cushions and insulates the body.

Obesity in animals, including humans, is not dependent on the amount of body weight, but on the amount of body fat - specifically adipose tissue.

In mammals, two types of adipose tissue exist: white adipose tissue (WAT) and brown adipose tissue (BAT).

Adipose tissue is primarily located beneath the skin, but is also found around internal organs.

In the integumentary system, which includes the skin, it accumulates in the deepest level, the subcutaneous layer, providing insulation from heat and cold.

Around organs, it provides protective padding.

It also functions as a reserve of nutrients

- From Science Daily

I don't know about insulin levels and cholesterol, but I have heard that humans tend to store toxins in their adipose tissue and that it is recommended that while dieting, you take a multivitamin daily. I've also read that consuming Omega 3's and 6"s helps with the burning of fat.

[andrew112]

Originally Posted by Honeywith4bees

Adipose tissue, or fat, is an anatomical term for loose connective tissue composed of adipocytes.

Its main role is to store energy in the form of fat, although it also cushions and insulates the body.

Obesity in animals, including humans, is not dependent on the amount of body weight, but on the amount of body fat - specifically adipose tissue.

In mammals, two types of adipose tissue exist: white adipose tissue (WAT) and brown adipose tissue (BAT).

Adipose tissue is primarily located beneath the skin, but is also found around internal organs.

In the integumentary system, which includes the skin, it accumulates in the deepest level, the subcutaneous layer, providing insulation from heat and cold.

Around organs, it provides protective padding.

It also functions as a reserve of nutrients

- From Science Daily

I don't know about insulin levels and cholesterol, but I have heard that humans tend to store toxins in their adipose tissue and that it is recommended that while dieting, you take a multivitamin daily. I've also read that consuming Omega 3's and 6"s helps with the burning of fat.

Are you sure that omega-6 fatty acids help with the burning of fat? I thought it was just omega-3 fatty acids that do that. From my own experience with experimenting with my diet, I have come to the conclusion that omega-6 fatty acids actually slow down metabolism. For example, I recently started consuming oat bran, which is very high in omega-6 fatty acids and low in omega-3 fatty acids; I have been gaining more weight every since and I feel like the food is sitting in my stomach for alot longer than when I did not consume food high in omega-6 fatty acids.

[Fullcrum]

There are two kinds of essential fatty acids: omega-3, and omega-6.

If you study the biology of nutrition, you'll find that the names of fatty acids are very similar to one another. Keep this in mind.

The lowercase omega in Greek is our w. The most basic form of fat is the triglyceride, which contains a glycerol (yes, alcohol) attached to three fatty acids, similar to the letter E.

Omega refers to the numbered bond from the designed end of the fatty acid that is the first carbon-carbon double bond. Imagine a straight line with dots in the middle representing carbon with a COOH (carboxyl) on the end. That's a fatty acid. Now count back three bonds from that COOH, and all omega-3s have their first double bonded carbon at that bond. Omega-6 has the first one at the sixth bond, and omega-9s at the 9th.

There are two fats that humans cannot synthesize from any other fatty acids. They are alpha-linoleic acid (ALA), the smallest Omega-3 fatty acid, precursor to all other omega-3 fatty acids, and linoleic acid (LA), the smallest omega-6 and precursor to all other Omega-6 fatty acids. The human body lacks the desaturase enzymes to break it apart other fatty acids for reconstituion into Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids.

Remember that Omega-6 and Omega-3 fats are types of polyunsaturated fats, that is, they have more than one double bonded carbon in their fatty acid structure.

Omega-9 fatty acids, with the exception of one (Mead acid), are monounsaturated fatty acids. The most famous Omega-9 is oleic acid, the main component of olive oil. Sound familiar?

Polyunsaturated fats generally degrade at low temperatures. Hence why you do not cook with them. Monounsaturated fats generally fare slightly better, but cooking with them still depends on the composition of the oil. Saturated fats are generally the most stable for cooking, as are trans fats. But trans fats are bad for you .

Oleic acid, the principle omega-9 fatty acid in olive oil, is the monounsaturated form of steric acid, which comprises between 15-20% of beef fat. Yes, beef fat is only around 50% saturated fat, the other 45% is monounsaturated (at least in grass-fed beef), and the final 5% is polyunsaturated. The other primary fat is palmitic acid, the most common saturated fat.

The body primarily uses three omega-3 fatty acids: ALA, EPA (eicosahexaeonic acid), and DHA (docosahexaeonic acid), which increase in size order respectively. Flax seeds contain more omega-3s than any fish, and all in ALA form. The other two are used only by animals, and are the two princple forms found in fish oil. Omega-3s, curiously, are found in the thylakoid membranes of the leaves of broadleaf plants. That's why purslane is so good for you. Omega-3 fatty acids are required for proper formation of cell membranes, neural connections, and lots of other stuff. It is controversial that babies cannot produce EPA or DHA until older, and so vegan babies need supplementation. I disagree with this - breast feeding is the way to go until they can make it.

The vast majority of the western world consumes too much omega-6 and not enough omega-3s.

[Honeywith4bees]

My Bad!

I was confusing Omega 6 with DHA. (I thought they were the same thing ! )

Forgive me????

[bdp]

According to John McDougall MD and Joel Fuhrman MD, the fat you eat is the fat your wear.

They say that you can biopsy your fat and see what it's made of: pig fat, soybean oil, milk fat, etc. In other words, that fat you consume can be directly deposited in your fat cells. This would probably be the origin of most of the fat on our bodies.

[Joeschmoe]

Neither of those were answers.

Humans are like any other animal, their fat contains saturated, mono and poly-unsaturated fats. Fat is stored in the body in the form of triglycerides, That is one Glycerin molecule with three fatty acids. You can go take a look at an interactive, 3-d model of the molecule here.

The fatty acids are comprised almost entirely of these 6 types:
Myristic 2-3% 14 Carbons Saturated
Palmitic 22-24% 16 Carbons Saturated
Palmitoleic 4-8% 16 Carbons mono- unsaturated
Stearic 4-8% 18 Carbons Saturated
Oleic 47-52% 18 Carbons mono- unsaturated (n-9)
Linoleic 11-12% 18 Carbons poly- unsaturated (n-6)

If you don't already know a Fatty acid is a long carbon chain with hydrogen. Carbon has 4 electrons in it's outer shell so it can share up to 4 of them. In a saturated fat all the carbons in a chain are single bonded and each one is also bonded to 2 hydrogen atoms. These fatty acids are long and straight and form a more coherent structure making the melting point higher than unsaturated fats. Myristic acid is saturated and looks like this:
Palmitoleic Acid is mono-unsaturated. It has one double carbon-carbon bond. This is where two of the carbons share 2 electons rather than just one. Those carbons only have room for one hydrogen bond each. These fatty acids fold up and are less organized then saturated fats and are therefore generally liquid at room temperature. Palmitoleic looks like this:
Adipose tissue also contains blood vessels, connective tissue, water and protien.