They travel through the blood to far-away tissues and organs, where they can bind to specific cell sites called receptors. By binding to receptors, hormones trigger different responses in the tissues that have these receptors.
In turns out that adipose, or fat, tissue is vitally connected to the whole question of hormones. Scientists used to think that adipose tissue was just fat, stuff that cushions and insulates the body and that stores energy.
That’s far from the real story, however. In truth, all of our fat tissue in the body makes up one very important endocrine organ that carries out vital command-and-control functions for metabolism and energy everywhere in the body.
Along with fat cells, adipose tissue is loaded with nerve cells and blood vessels.
It’s always storing and releasing energy to fuel the body’s energy needs, at any given time, by releasing hormones.
Of these, three of the hormones released and controlled by fat include leptin, resistin and adiponectin.
As incredibly important as these and other fat hormones are, amazingly they were only recently discovered — leptin and adiponectin in the 1990s and resistin in 2001.