IT SOUNDS like the perfect remedy for modern life: a pill that simultaneously reduces both belly fat and blood pressure. And it may already exist.
High blood pressure is often treated with drugs called ACE inhibitors, which block angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE). ACE usually constricts blood vessels and so raises blood pressure. It is also expressed in fat cells, and previous studies had suggested that it might trigger fat accumulation.
To investigate exactly what ACE does, Michael Mathai of the Howard Florey Institute in Melbourne, Australia, and colleagues engineered mice to lack the ACE gene. These mice turned out to…
