Cell metal: how does a high-fat, high carbohydrate diet affect brain health?

September 17, 2019 / BIOON / -- many researches will clarify the molecular mechanism of obesity induced by unhealthy diet, but they do not deeply analyze how diet causes neural changes in individual brain? Recently, in a research report published in the international journal cell metabolism, scientists from Yale University found that high-fat diet may induce dysfunction of the brain hypothalamus region, which can regulate the body's weight balance and metabolism Photo source: stock.adobe.com In this paper, the researchers evaluated the molecular mechanism of hypothalamic inflammation stimulated by high-fat diet (especially the diet with high content of fat and carbohydrate) Hypothalamic inflammation is a physiological reaction in obese and malnourished individuals The researchers pointed out that the occurrence of hypothalamic inflammation occurs three days after an individual ingests high-fat food, or even in his or her body They are very interested in the fact that these changes happen so fast, even before the weight changes, so they want to understand the cellular mechanism behind them The researchers observed the hypothalamic inflammation in the animal brain under high-fat diet It was found that the physical structure of microglia in animal brain changed significantly Microglia were the first line of defense in the central nervous system, and they found that the activation of microglia depends on the changes of mitochondria, and animal with high fat diet Mitochondria in microglia are very small The size of mitochondria depends on a special protein called uncoupling protein 2 (UCP2), which can regulate the energy utilization of mitochondria, affect the energy control in hypothalamus and the self balance of glucose When receiving the inflammatory signal stimulated by high-fat diet, the animals in the high-fat diet group will be stimulated to eat more food, resulting in obesity At this time, the activation of microglia mediated by UCP2 in the animal body will affect the function of neurons in the brain However, when the mechanism is blocked by removing UCP2 from microglia, the animals exposed to high-fat diet will be reduced Food intake and tolerance to weight gain This study not only elucidates the mechanism of high-fat diet affecting the health of the body, but also reveals the mechanism of unhealthy diet changing the intake of the body from the nerve When we touch certain types of food, the unique mechanism in the brain will be activated From the perspective of evolution, this may be a very important mechanism, however, when the diet rich in fat and carbohydrate is constantly changing When it appears, it may be harmful to the health of the body The long-term goal of the researchers is to understand the molecular mechanism regulating the amount of food eaten by the body Later, they will continue to study and clarify how activated microglia affect the occurrence of various diseases in the brain, including Alzheimer's disease Alzheimer's disease is a special neurological disorder, which is directly related to the changes of microglia in the brain, and in obesity The incidence is high in the population Original source: Jung DAE Kim, nal AE Yoon, Sungho Jin, et al Microglial UCP2 mediates inflammation and objective induced by high fat feeding, cell metabolism (2019) Doi: 10.1016/j.cmet.2019.08.010