![Sample our Food Science & Technology journals, sign in here to start your access, latest two full volumes FREE to you for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5936/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Food-Science-Technology.jpg"})
Abstract
There is now substantial evidence indicating that a critical genetic determinant in the propensity to fatness and leanness resides in the way in which the metabolic machinery manages a surplus or a deficit in food intake. From an integrated analysis of past and new data on the pattern of lean and fat tissue deposition or mobilisation during experimental overfeeding, underfeeding and refeeding, this review brings into focus the main determinants of interindividual variability in the regulation of body composition, and discusses their importance in the capacity to adapt to intermittent food availability under conditions of subsistence, and upon their role in susceptibility to obesity in more affluent societies.