Michael D. Nelson1, Vinaya Simha2, Edward Szczepaniak1, Ronald G. Victor1, Abhimanyu Garg2, Lidia S. Szczepaniak1
1Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, United States; 2UT Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, United States
Obesity is associated with ectopic accumulation of fat in organs such as the heart, skeletal muscle and the liver. Seminal basic research suggests that excessive accumulation of fat in non-adipocytes triggers adverse signaling pathways ultimately leading to organ dysfunction. Patients with generalized lipodystrophies, have near total lack of body fat and provide the unique opportunity to study the effects of ectopic myocardial fat deposition in the absence of obesity.