Plasticity and heterogeneity of thermogenic adipose tissue

TLDR: Sun et al. as mentioned in this paper discuss the heterogeneity of thermogenic adipocytes and their precursors, highlighting the single-cell technologies that help to characterize adipose tissues in depth, and discuss the unprecedented insights that they have gained into the heterogeneity, due to the technical developments in singlecell and nucleus technologies, which increased their understanding of how adipose tissue catabolic function is influenced by developmental and intercellular communication events.

Abstract: The perception of adipose tissue, both in the scientific community and in the general population, has changed dramatically in the past 20 years. While adipose tissue was thought for a long time to be a rather simple lipid storage entity, it is now recognized as a highly heterogeneous organ and a critical regulator of systemic metabolism, composed of many different subtypes of cells, with important endocrine functions. Additionally, adipose tissue is nowadays recognized to contribute to energy turnover, due to the presence of specialized thermogenic adipocytes, which can be found in many adipose depots. This review discusses the unprecedented insights that we have gained into the heterogeneity of thermogenic adipocytes and their respective precursors due to the technical developments in single-cell and nucleus technologies. These methodological advances have increased our understanding of how adipose tissue catabolic function is influenced by developmental and intercellular communication events. Adipose tissue has emerged as a highly heterogeneous organ. Sun et al. discuss the heterogeneity of thermogenic adipocytes and their precursors, highlighting the single-cell technologies that help to characterize adipose tissues in depth.