Biology 8th Edition by Kenneth Mason ,Jonathan Losos,Susan Singer,Peter Raven,George Johnson

Exercise 3

Human babies and hibernating or cold-adapted animals are able to maintain body temperature (a process called thermogenesis ) due to the presence of brown fat. Brown fat is characterized by a high concentration of mitochondria. These brown fat mitochondria have a special protein located within their inner membranes. Thermogenin is a protein that functions as a passive proton transporter. Propose a likely explanation for the role of brown fat in thermogenesis based on your knowledge of metabolism, transport, and the structure and function of mitochondria.