Research

Hormonal

Intracellular regulation of thyroid hormone by deiodinases (D1, D2, D3) dictates tissue-specific metabolic outcomes, where local T3 activation promotes energy expenditure and lipid mobilization, while inactivation preserves energy stores.

Your body's metabolic rate isn't just determined by your thyroid gland's output, but by how your specific tissues process that hormone. Enzymes called deiodinases activate or deactivate thyroid hormone locally in organs like muscle and fat. This means two people with identical blood thyroid levels can have vastly different metabolic rates and fat storage tendencies depending on their tissue-specific enzyme activity.

GoodSupportsHIGH confidence
Thyroid hormones (THs) are key determinants of cellular metabolism and regulate a variety of pathways that are involved in the metabolism of carbohydrates, lipids and proteins in several target tissues. Notably, hyperthyroidism induces a hyper-metabolic state characterized by increased resting energy expenditure, reduced cholesterol levels, increased lipolysis and gluconeogenesis followed by weight loss, whereas hypothyroidism induces a hypo-metabolic state characterized by reduced energy expenditure, reduced lipolysis and gluconeogenesis followed by weight gain.
Annunziata Gaetana Cicatiello et al. · Frontiers in Endocrinology · 2018

Why this rating

Based on a review of multiple mouse models and human genetic associations, though it is a mini-review rather than primary clinical trial data.

Source

Metabolic Effects of the Intracellular Regulation of Thyroid Hormone: Old Players, New Concepts

Annunziata Gaetana Cicatiello et al. · Frontiers in Endocrinology · 2018

DOI 10.3389/fendo.2018.00474

narrative_reviewCited 177×
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DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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