Mechanism of Action
Lipolysis Stimulation
Last updated
Prompting fat cells to break stored triglyceride down into free fatty acids and glycerol, and to release them into the blood. It is the mobilisation step and nothing more. Whether those fatty acids are then burned or simply put back into storage is a separate matter, governed largely by overall energy balance.
Why it matters here
This mechanism is the source of the most common category error on the site. A record can be well supported for lipolysis and carry nothing at all for fat loss, and the two live in different fields with different rungs on the ladder at /evidence/rubric.
What it is not
Lipolysis is not fat loss: releasing fat from a fat cell does not remove it from the body, and unburned fatty acids are re-esterified and stored again. Fat mobilisation and fat oxidation resolve both here and to our Fat Loss outcome, and fat oxidation is a distinct step from lipolysis rather than another word for it.
Also called
- lipolysis
- fat mobilization
- lipolytic signalling
- fat oxidation
- lipolysis signaling
- fat mobilization signalling
- lipolytic
Lipolytic is the adjective and describes the breakdown of stored fat inside a cell. It does not mean loss of body fat, though it is very often used as if it did.