Lose weight by freezing? The new weight loss strategy

The days are getting shorter, temperatures are dropping and everyone is talking about winter fat again. On the one hand, this may be due to the hearty meals suitable for cold days, but also to the fact that we overlook the odd lifebelt under our mountains of clothes until it's time to head back to the beach. Van Marken Lichtenbelt from Maastricht University describes another component in Trends in Endocrinology and Metabolism: The heating.

Freezing helps you lose weight

By now, every child knows that if you want to lose weight, you either have to eat fewer calories or burn more calories through physical activity. The keyword is: negative energy balance and is usually a thorn in the side of anyone who wants to lose weight. But energy consumption can also be boosted without physical exertion - by freezing! But you don't have to shiver to do this - even 18 to 19 degrees Celsius increases energy consumption significantly. Where a lot helps, more helps better, as a study from Japan confirms: staying in a room at temperatures of 17 degrees Celsius for just 2 hours a day resulted in a reduction in fat tissue after just 6 weeks. The body should get used to the new, cold environment very quickly, according to van Marken Lichtenbelt. For this reason, temperature training at 15 degrees Celsius should be carried out for six hours a day, whereby the body should become accustomed to the cold within 10 days. Room temperatures of 18 to 19 degrees Celsius then become easily bearable and the pounds can tumble off. Although the approach might appeal to many a sports fanatic, its feasibility remains questionable. At the latest when it is introduced in offices, one would certainly be confronted with protests...

Sources (in English):

Lichtenbelt, W. v. M., Kingma, B., van der Lans, A.,& Schellen, L. (2014). Cold exposure - an approach to increasing energy expenditure in humans. Trends in Endocrinology and Metabolism, 25(4):165-7, doi: 10.1016/j.tem.2014.01.001

Van Marken Lichtenbelt, W. D., Vanhommerig, J. W., Smulders, N. M., Drossaerts, J., Kemerink, G. J., Bouvy, N. D. et al. (2009, April). Cold-Activated Brown Adipose Tissue in Healthy Men. The New England Journal of Medicine, 360:1500-1508, doi: DOI: 10.1056/NEJMoa0808718