Fatter and Fatter and…

How fat are Americans becoming? Maps from the Centers for Disease Control show the year-by-year progression

Carrie McCurdy, a new assistant professor in the department of human physiology, studies the causes of obesity at the cellular level.

It’s a critical topic, because obesity is surging in the U.S. More than one-third of U.S. adults are obese and about 17 percent of U.S. children are obese. If Americans stay on the current path, more than 80 percent of men and 70 percent of women will be overweight or obese by 2020.

Obesity-related conditions include heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes and certain types of cancer, some of the leading causes of preventable death.

In the video below, obesity trends in the United States are tracked over a 25-year period by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, ending in 2010. The maps show how the center has repeatedly added new categories to capture rising obesity rates in the country.