Research
Hormonal
In the context of preexisting severe obesity and adipose tissue dysfunction (ob/ob mice), blocking VEGF-A signaling reduces body weight gain, improves insulin sensitivity, and decreases inflammation by inducing apoptosis in dysfunctional, hypoxic adipocytes.
This study suggests that treatments targeting blood vessels in fat might help people with severe, established obesity by reducing the number of unhealthy, inflamed fat cells. This is a complex medical intervention and not a lifestyle strategy.
GoodQualifiesHIGH confidence
However, the same VEGF-A–VEGFR2 blockade in ob/ob mice leads to a reduced body-weight gain, an improvement in insulin sensitivity, a decrease in inflammatory factors, and increased incidence of adipocyte death.
Why this rating
Strong mechanistic evidence in a severe obesity model (ob/ob mice).
Source
Dichotomous effects of VEGF-A on adipose tissue dysfunction
Kai Sun et al. · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2012
DOI 10.1073/pnas.1200447109
mechanism_onlyCited 431×
Read the paper DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10
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