Scientists Just Made A Major Genetic Discovery That Could Lead To The Next Ozempic

Medications like Ozempic, Wegovy, and Zepbound have completely revolutionized the health space, helping people who have obesity or are overweight lose a significant amount of weight. But these medications have had shortages and can be incredibly expensive, making them inaccessible for many.

Now, research highlights a discovery that could pave the way for a new class of weight loss medications—and it’s linked to how your body responds to exercise. Here’s what the study discovered, plus what it could mean for the future of drugs like Ozempic.

Meet the expert: Mir Ali, MD, a bariatric surgeon and medical director of MemorialCare Surgical Weight Loss Center at Orange Coast Medical Center in Fountain Valley, California.

What did the study find?

The study, which was published in June in the journal Molecular Metabolism, analyzed mouse and human models to explore how the protein PGC-1α impacts exercise and its effects on the body. In case you’re not familiar with it (and why would you be?), PGC-1α is a protein that is involved in several processes in the body, including thermogenesis. Thermogenesis works to help your body efficiently consume energy in your muscles.

When you work out, more PGC-1α is expressed in your muscles and more energy is burned. But people who lose weight slowly when they do regular physical activity may be missing variants of PGC-1α that regulate the body’s metabolism and response to short-term exercise.

By targeting this protein, scientists think they can essentially help to rev up your metabolism. The researchers concluded in the study that increasing how much PGC-1α is expressed is “pivotal” for burning more energy and “essential” for regulating metabolism.

What does this study mean for fitness?

At this point, it’s hard to say. The scientists just discovered that it could be helpful to target this protein for weight loss, but the details and kinks of this haven’t been worked out just yet.

But it’s possible that people who already burn fat efficiently with the help of exercise wouldn’t be helped by a medication that targets PGC-1α, says Mir Ali, MD, a bariatric surgeon and medical director of MemorialCare Surgical Weight Loss Center at Orange Coast Medical Center in Fountain Valley, California. Still, it’s super early on in the process, making it tough to determine for sure.

What does this mean for weight loss drugs?

It’s not clear at this point. Again, this is in very early stages and there’s a lot that still needs to be explored. However, there is a chance that this could lead to a new class of weight loss drugs, giving people with overweight and obesity more options, Ali says.

Right now, Ali sees this as a potential additional tool to help with weight loss versus the only tool someone would use.

“The majority of weight loss is because of diet,” he says. “Exercise has a number of benefits, including enhanced weight loss, and it can improve cardiovascular health.”

If there’s a medication that could enhance how well you burn fat through exercise, “that would be an additional tool to use,” Ali says. But, he adds, “we’re a long way from that.”