I have no idea if this is some sort of consolation or anything. However, people with big bottoms may have one thing more to be cheerful as researchers in United States has found a type of fat that accumulates around the hips and bottom that may actually offer some protection against diabetes.

"It was a suprising result," Said Dr Ronald Kahn of Havard Medical School. "We actually found it had beneficial effect and it was especially true when you put the fat inside the abdomen." The subcutaneous fat, or fat that collects under the skin, helped to improve sensitivity to the hormone insulin, which regulates blood sugar.

The study was in fact to study why fat in different parts of the body seems to have different risks of metabolic diseases such as diabetes. Its been known for sometime that fat that collects in the abdomen (visceral fat) can raise a person's risk of diabetes and heart disease, whiile people with pear-shaped bodies, with fat deposits in bottoms and hips, are less prone to those disorders.

The experiments were conducted on mice where they transplanted subcutaneous fat from donr mice into bellies and under the skin of other mice. "What we found was that when we put it in either place, there was some improvement in metabolism," Dr Kahn said.

This is an important results as it means not all fat is bad. His team is now finding the substances produced in subcutaneous fat that provide the benefit with the hope of developing a drug that might copy this effect.