The Brain Is Mostly Fat: How Dietary Lipids Support Mood, Focus, and Metabolic Signaling
The Brain Is Mostly Fat: How Dietary Lipids Support Mood, Focus, and Metabolic Signaling The human brain is an extraordinary organ—representing just two percent of body weight while consuming roughly twenty percent of the body's total energy expenditure. What many people find surprising is that nearly sixty percent of the brain's dry weight consists of fat, making it the fattiest organ in the body. This lipid-rich composition is not incidental. The fats that make up brain tissue serve critical structural roles, forming the membranes of billions of neurons and the myelin sheaths that insulate neural pathways, enabling the rapid electrical signaling that underlies every thought, emotion, sensation, and action. The specific types of fats incorporated into brain structure come largely from diet. While the body can synthesize some fatty acids internally, others must be obtained from food—particularly the omega-3 and omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids that play essential role...