How do white and brown adipose tissues differ histologically?
White adipose tissue contains large, unilocular adipocytes, whereas brown adipose tissue is made up of smaller, multilocular adipocytes with numerous lipid droplets and abundant mitochondria. The high mitochondrial content and presence of uncoupling protein 1 (UCP1) in BAT enable it to generate heat by dissipating the proton gradient across the mitochondrial membrane, a process known as non-shivering thermogenesis.
