ABSTRACT
The prevalence of obesity continues to grow and reaches epidemic proportions worldwide. The impact of obesity and its health complications is a major public health problem. It is clearly established that obesity is associated with a complex interplay between genetics and epigenetics predisposition, environment, nutrition, and lifestyle. In this context, understanding the molecular mechanisms for the onset of obesity will provide important information for prevention and treatment of this disease. Recently, numerous studies have suggested an important role of epigenetic mechanisms in the development of obesity and associated metabolic diseases. Many studies suggest that noncoding RNAs (ncRNAs) such as microRNA (miRNAs) and long noncoding RNA (lncRNAs) play a major role in the expression of key genes for energy homeostasis via epigenetic mechanisms. Interestingly, several miRNAs and lncRNAs have been found to modulate adipose tissue biology (adipogenesis and metabolism) and insulin secretion and sensitivity, hence the dysregulation of these ncRNAs can lead to obesity as well as related metabolic complications. Although the miRNAs and lncRNAs are involved in several aspects of metabolic syndrome, this chapter provides recent data about the potential involvement of miRNAs and lncRNAs in obesity.
