Occurrence of periadrenal brown adipose tissue in adult Slovak population.

Objectives: The brown adipose tissue is distributed only in specific locations of the mammalian body. Evidence has been presented that the brown fat occurs in human foetuses and new-borns. At later stages of life, most brown fat cells disappear and only persist in the perirenal and periaortic adipose tissue. However, detailed data on the occurrence of brown adipose tissue in adult humans differ among existing studies.

Design: The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of brown adipose tissue in adult Slovak population.

Subjects and methods: The samples of periadrenal adipose tissue were taken from 379 consecutive autopsies of subjects aged between 26 and 94 years, fixed in formalin, processed by routine methods and stained with hematoxylin-eosin. The sections were examined by light microscopy.

Results and conclusions: Brown adipose tissue cells were found in 240 (63%) cases. The prevalence of brown adipose tissue decreases below the age of 50 and later slightly increases. No significant differences in the prevalence of brown adipose tissue between men and women were found. With the exception of Germany, this study is currently the first extensive morphological autopsy study of brown adipose tissue prevalence in adults in Central and Eastern Europe.