Adipotide
Weight Management
In plain English
Adipotide is an experimental compound designed to shrink fat by cutting off the blood supply to fat tissue, causing those fat cells to die. It caused rapid weight loss in obese monkeys, but it also affected the kidneys in those studies, and it has never been tested in humans. There is no human safety or efficacy data, so it should be regarded as strictly investigational.
The science
Adipotide is a pro-apoptotic peptidomimetic that targets prohibitin/ANXA2 on the vasculature supplying white adipose tissue and triggers endothelial apoptosis, effectively starving fat depots of blood supply. In the key preclinical study (Barnhart et al., Science Translational Medicine 2011), spontaneously obese rhesus monkeys lost ~11% of body weight over 4 weeks with improved insulin resistance, but dose-dependent, reversible renal proximal-tubule injury (rising creatinine) was observed. There are no published human clinical trials; human clinical evidence is absent and the renal safety signal is a serious concern. This remains an investigational, non-approved agent.