This comprehensive synthesis of current medical and evolutionary literature addresses key questions about the role body fat plays in human biology. It explores how body energy stores are regulated, how they develop over the life-course, what biological functions they serve, and how they may have evolved. There is now substantial evidence that human adiposity is not merely a buffer against the threat of starvation, but is also a resource for meeting the energy costs of growth, reproduction and immune function. As such it may be considered as important in our species evolution as other traits such as bipedalism, large brains, and long life spans and developmental periods. Indeed, adiposity is integrally linked with these other traits, and with our capacity to colonise and inhabit diverse ecosystems. It is because human metabolism is so sensitive to environmental cues that manipulative economic forces are now generating the current obesity epidemic.
The Evolutionary Biology of Human Body Fatness
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Book Description
Timely analysis of medical and evolutionary data to address the role body fat has played in human biology, including in the current obesity epidemic. Obesity researchers from human biologists and anthropologists to health professionals will benefit from this comprehensive evolutionary approach to examining human body composition.
About the Author
Jonathan C. K. Wells is a Reader in Pediatric Nutrition at the University College London (UCL) Institute of Child Health. He conducts research on pediatric energetics and body composition, using anthropological and evolutionary approaches to inform biological understanding.
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By Jim S.
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
The Evolution of Human Body Fatness is an excellent book that is extremely well researched. It is scientific and objective. As I read the book I felt the author was truly trying to seek the truth and wisdom rather than to promote a particular belief. I strongly feel that this book is mandatory reading for anyone who works in health and nutrition or doing research on food consumption and obesity. Jim Swaffield - University of Alberta
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