Scientists study bears to learn about obesity
By Jonathan D. Rockoff, Wall Street Journal
PULLMAN, Wash. — On a recent visit to a laboratory where he researches obesity, Kevin Corbit walked over to one of the patients he is studying to say hello. Then he clasped a claw.
Corbit, a scientist at drug maker Amgen Inc., is conducting his research on grizzly bears. He believes insights gleaned from the animals, who can take in as much as 58,000 calories in a day and weigh 1,000 pounds, could reshape understanding of obesity and identify new treatments for a condition that has stymied doctors and drug developers.
“When I thought about obesity, I thought about Yogi bear,” Corbit says.
Ursus arctos horribilis isn’t the typical lab rat. A grizzly can lift a heavy tree trunk—with one paw. In the wild, the bears win duels with wolves and mountain lions. They are powerful enough to tear through the side of a barn or even crush a small car. Also, the bears growl.
But bears do know a thing or two about weight gain, and that makes them more like people than rats whose genes are manipulated to make them obese.
58,000 calories is the same as 17 pounds of pure fat.
The volume of food to take all this in must be huge unless he is eating gallons of mayonnaise or peanut butter.
Suspicious, your math is rounded off very close. Yet I must question the physiology behind it not doing the research myself. Although 3,500 excess calories equate 1 lb of weight gain in a human, does it equate to the same weight gain in a bear?
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