Research

Hormonal

Visceral adipose tissue (VAT) in individuals with Type 2 Diabetes (T2D) expresses significantly higher levels of proinflammatory molecules (TNFα, MIP, IL-8) compared to controls, and this expression correlates with fasting glucose and insulin resistance.

Visceral fat is metabolically active and releases inflammatory signals that worsen insulin resistance. While you cannot directly 'exercise off' visceral fat inflammation, reducing visceral fat through caloric deficit and exercise is the most effective way to lower these inflammatory markers and improve insulin sensitivity.

ModerateSupportsMEDIUM confidence
Subjects with T2D had higher VAT expression of molecules regulating inflammation (tumor necrosis factor-α (TNFα), macrophage inflammatory protein (MIP), interleukin-8 (IL-8)).
Katherine Samaras et al. · Obesity · 2009

Why this rating

Small sample size (n=16), cross-sectional design, but uses gold-standard insulin clamp.

Source

Subcutaneous and Visceral Adipose Tissue Gene Expression of Serum Adipokines That Predict Type 2 Diabetes

Katherine Samaras et al. · Obesity · 2009

DOI 10.1038/oby.2009.443

cross_sectional · n=16Cited 283×
Read the paper
DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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