Obesity often leads to high blood pressure, and high blood pressure can cause heart disease, which is the leading cause of death around the world.
While we’ve long known that body fat plays a big role in this chain, scientists haven’t clearly understood why. What exactly is it about fat that affects how our blood vessels work and how our body controls blood pressure?
Now, a new study has found an answer. A special type of fat in the body called beige fat may help keep blood pressure under control. This fat is different from the white fat that stores calories.
Beige fat burns energy and creates heat. It behaves similarly to brown fat, which is found in babies and some adults and is known to help with healthy metabolism.
Researchers noticed that people with more brown fat tend to have lower blood pressure. To better understand this, scientists at Rockefeller University studied mice that were healthy in every way—except they could not form beige fat.
These mice were missing a gene called Prdm16, which helps fat cells become beige fat. When this gene was removed, the fat stayed white instead of becoming beige.
The results were striking. These mice had higher blood pressure and showed signs of blood vessel damage. The fat near their blood vessels changed in harmful ways.
It started acting more like white fat and began producing a substance called angiotensinogen. This leads to more of a hormone called angiotensin II, which narrows blood vessels and raises blood pressure.
Their arteries became more sensitive to angiotensin II. The vessels also became stiffer and less flexible, making the heart work harder. This shows that beige fat normally helps keep blood vessels relaxed and healthy. When it’s missing, the system becomes unbalanced.
Researchers wanted to know what was causing the blood vessels to stiffen. They studied the fluids that fat cells release and discovered one major culprit: an enzyme called QSOX1.
Normally, beige fat keeps this enzyme turned off. But in mice without beige fat, QSOX1 became overactive. This enzyme is known to change tissue structure, and in this case, it triggered the stiffening of blood vessels.
To confirm that QSOX1 was the cause, they created a second group of mice with both the Prdm16 and Qsox1 genes removed. These mice still didn’t have beige fat, but their blood pressure stayed normal. This showed that QSOX1 was the key factor linking the loss of beige fat to high blood pressure.
The team also found similar patterns in human data. People with mutations in the PRDM16 gene had higher blood pressure, which supports the idea that beige fat plays a role in keeping blood pressure healthy in humans too.
This study shows that not all fat is bad. In fact, beige fat may protect us from heart disease by keeping our blood vessels in good shape. It also opens up new possibilities for treating high blood pressure.
If scientists can find ways to control QSOX1 or encourage the growth of beige fat, they may be able to help people who suffer from hypertension—especially those who don’t respond well to current treatments.
The research also highlights how discoveries in the lab can help explain real problems in patients. By using mouse models, the scientists were able to go back and figure out the exact steps that lead from fat changes to high blood pressure. This kind of research could lead to personalized treatments that are based on a person’s body and genes.
In summary, this study uncovers a new way that fat affects blood pressure. Beige fat seems to play a protective role by stopping harmful signals from white fat.
Without it, the body may produce more of an enzyme that stiffens blood vessels and increases blood pressure. By learning more about this process, we may find new ways to prevent or treat heart disease.
If you care about high blood pressure, please read studies that early time-restricted eating could help improve blood pressure, and natural coconut sugar could help reduce blood pressure and artery stiffness.
For more health information, please see recent studies about added sugar in your diet linked to higher blood pressure, and results showing vitamin D could improve blood pressure in people with diabetes.
The study is published in Science.
Copyright © 2025 Knowridge Science Report. All rights reserved.
