“People have mainly looked at the short-term effects of dieting. We wanted to see what changes happen in the brain over the long term,” explains Henning Fenslau, a researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Metabolism Research who led the study.
To this end, the researchers put the mice on a diet and assessed which circuits in the brain changed. Specifically, they examined a group of neurons in the hypothalamus, AGRP neurons, which are known to control the feeling of hunger.
They were able to show that the neuronal pathways that excite AgRP neurons send enhanced signals when the mice are on the diet. This profound change in the brain can be detected long after the diet.