Latest Hypothalamus Stories

Findings could help travelers, shift workers adjust to changes in time zones and overnight schedulesIn investigating the intricacies of the body's biological rhythms, scientists at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) have discovered the existence of a "food-related clock" which can supersede the "light-based" master clock that serves as the body's primary timekeeper.The findings, which appear in the May 23 issue of the journal Science, help explain how animals adapt their circadian...

New findings of a U.S.-based study showed that blocking a single brain enzyme caused mice to eat less and maintain better blood glucose levels. Researchers hope the results will lead to new improvements in the treatment of obesity and diabetes in humans."We believe we have identified an important drug development target that could potentially turn into a metabolic triple play: appetite control, weight loss and blood sugar management," said Tony Means of Duke University Medical...

A gut hormone that causes people to eat more does so by making food appear more desirable, suggests a new report in the May issue of Cell Metabolism, a publication of Cell Press. In a brain imaging study of individuals, the researchers found that reward centers respond more strongly to pictures of food in subjects who had received an infusion of the hormone known as ghrelin.The findings suggest that the two drives for feeding"”metabolic signals and pleasure signals"”are actually...

Why do rats live faster and die younger than humans? A newly discovered biological clock provides tantalizing cluesThis clock, or biological rhythm, controls many metabolic functions and is based on the circadian rhythm, which is a roughly 24-hour cycle that is important in determining sleeping and feeding patterns, cell regeneration, and other biological processes in mammals.The newly discovered rhythm, like the circadian rhythm, originates in the hypothalamus, a region of the brain that...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. "” A single protein in brain cells may act as a linchpin in the body's weight-regulating system, playing a key role in the flurry of signals that govern fat storage, sugar use, energy balance and weight, University of Michigan Medical School researchers report. And although it's far too early to say how this protein could be useful in new strategies to fight the world's epidemic of obesity, the finding gives scientists an important system to target in future research and...

BOSTON -- A study led by a scientific team at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) provides another important step in our understanding of the critical role that the brain's molecular pathways play in the development of obesity and related disorders. The findings, reported in the November 4, 2005 issue of the journal Cell, demonstrate for the first time that the neuronal pathways that help to keep body weight stable diverge at the melanocortin-4 receptor (MC4R) to regulate either food...

Researchers at Yale School of Medicine provide direct evidence that two parts of a neuronal system, one that promotes eating and another that suppresses eating, are critical for the acute regulation of eating and body weight, according to a study published online in the September 11 issue of Nature Neuroscience. The paper makes it clear that the agouti-related peptide-expressing (AgRP) neurons are mandatory for eating. "Previous studies showed that the brain, particularly the...

(Philadelphia, PA) "“ Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have discovered that the recently identified neurotransmitter orexin (also known as hypocretin) influences reward processing by activating neurons in the lateral hypothalamus region of the brain. By identifying the relationship between orexin neurons and behaviors associated with reward seeking, drug relapse, and addiction, researchers hope to find new treatments for drug addiction. Previous studies have...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. "“ What do laboratory mice at the University of Michigan Medical School have in common with millions of overweight Americans? Like many of us, these mice just can't stop eating. They weigh twice as much as their littermates, consume nearly two times as much food, have elevated fatty acid and triglyceride levels, are resistant to insulin, and often develop type 2 diabetes. Scientists at the University of Michigan Medical School are studying these mice to find out what causes...

A weight control protein with a key role in the brain's ability to monitor body fat content may yield new approaches for treating obesity and type 2 diabetes, according to a new report in the August issue of Cell Metabolism. The findings in mice further suggest that particular variants of the protein SH2-B might underlie obesity in humans, the researchers said. SH2-B, which has multiple functions in cells throughout the body, keeps the brain sensitive to the fat hormone leptin, found...