Maintaining weight loss long-term is an uphill battle. And the hormonal, metabolic, and neurological factors that control body weight may be more biological than mere willpower.

One of the most frustrating aspects for many people is calorie restriction, with dieters regaining half of all pounds lost within two years, and about 80% after five years. According to information published by New Atlas, citing the journal Cell Metabolism, some may perceive it as a personal failure and have long-term physical, emotional and psychological consequences.

good news

In this regard, researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Metabolic Research MBIMR and Harvard Medical School succeeded in identifying an important change in neural pathways in the brain during dieting. .

The ability to block these signals could help scientists develop treatments to help them maintain their weight.

Weight loss – obvious

Changes in the brain

“Research has mainly focused on short-term effects after dieting,” said MPIMR researcher Henning Fanselow, who led the study.

Previous studies have shown how stimulating neurons leads to sharp increases in food consumption. They discovered that the neural pathways leading to AgRP neurons were amplified when the lab mice were on a diet and remained in those amplified states, resulting in intense hunger signals leading to food intake and rapid weight gain.

Expression of hunger

Appetitive neurons

“This work increases understanding of how neural wiring controls appetite,” said co-author Bradford Lowell of Harvard Medical School.

He continued, “We previously discovered a large group of primary neurons that excite AgRP physically synergistically with appetitive neurons.

In our current study, physical neurotransmitter coupling between these two neurons increases dramatically with feeding and weight loss, in a process known as synaptic plasticity, resulting in prolonged overeating.

Food is healthy food

Decrease in body weight

When the researchers blocked the connection between those neurons, AgRP activity decreased and the lab rats’ response to food intake became more restricted. Not surprisingly, this leads to significantly less weight gain.

Wincillo explained that the study’s results provide an explanation and an opportunity to reduce the impact of the swing effect of caloric restriction. In the long term, the goal is to develop treatments in humans that help maintain body weight after dieting.

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