A compound present in apple skin, ursolic acid , reduces obesity and associated health problems thanks to its ability to increase the amount of muscle and brown fat , two tissues with a high capacity to burn calories . Christopher Adams and his colleagues at the University of Iowa (USA), who specialize in diabetes studies, have come to that conclusion. By testing the effects of the compound in mice on a high-fat diet, the researchers found that while increasing skeletal muscle and changing white fat from "love handles" to brown fat, ursolic acid was able to reduce the incidence of obesity, diabetes and fatty liver . This last condition has no treatment, is associated with excess weight, and affects one in five adults in the United States.
To this is added that the apple skin also managed to increase the strength and endurance of the animals , and made them burn more calories daily than other rodents with the same weight and the same activity that did not ingest ursolic acid. The findings have been published in the journal PLoS ONE .
