- #1
loseyourname
Staff Emeritus
Gold Member
- 1,830
- 5
This was a question given to one of my classes on an exam some time back. I wonder if anyone here can nail it. I know the answer now of course, but I'm curious to see what the posters will think.
In the 1940s, some physicians prescribed low doses of a drug called dinitrophenol (DNP) to help patients lose weight. This unsafe method was abandoned after a few patients died. DNP uncouples the chemiosmotic machinery by making the lipid bilayer of the inner mitochondrial membrane leaky to H+. Explain how this causes weight loss.