Researchers Say The Body Weight Thermostat Needs Changing

This research is likely to open up new avenues of treatment for obesity

A researcher from the University of Alberta in Canada claims that not only does overeating make you put on weight but it actually changes the chemical structure of your brain.  Dr. William Colmers who is the resident Professor of Pharmacology at the University of Alberta explained that when you become overweight or obese and go on a diet your brain responds by thinking that you are starving and that is why it increases the hunger pangs signals to your stomach making you crave food.

Dr. Colmers who is leading a team studying the neurobiology of obesity said that the brain should be considered to have a “body weight thermostat” and in the case of obese individuals the thermostat is set at the wrong point making their bodies crave food thus leading to overeating.

The complicated research has been done using digital imaging of the brains of mice and rats as well as electrophysiology technology which allows the researchers to examine exactly how neurotransmitters work and send signals in the brain.  According to Dr. Colmers, in obese people the part of the brain which deals with hedonistic desires and the part which is responsible for stabilising the amount of calories that you eat with regard to the energy that you need are out of sync with each other.  He said that a long term high calorie diet can disrupt the homeostatic system which stabilises your food intake permanently.

This fascinating research is likely to open up new avenues of treatment for obesity and confirms that much of the problem that obese individuals have with their weight stems from psychological and neurobiological reasons. If these scientists can develop some sort of treatment to control the “body weight thermostat” they would be looking at revolutionary weight loss advances which could affect the whole of the weight loss industry.