Why Do We Eat: New Insight into the Role of Brain Neurotransmitters

Why Do We Eat: New Insight into the Role of Brain Neurotransmitters

Eating has taken its toll on people who live in the United States. One of the largest problems that people have is deciding how much to eat and what is healthy to eat. It was determined in the 1930s-1940s that the brain has a tremendous impact in controlling our eating habits. The main part of the brain, which controls this, is the hypothalamus. Basically, the hypothalamus measures different levels through out the body, especially in the stomach, to determine if our body needs food, which causes the sensation of hunger.

Neurotransmitters are responsible for sending signals to and from the brain to certain parts of the body. There are many different neurotransmitters, which have been studied that have an influence on a person's eating inhibitory. Some of these neurotransmitters include norepinephrine, pancreatic polypeptide, galanin, opioid peptides, glumate, and gherlin.

The study presented in this presentation focus on four different aspects of the influence of neurotransmitters that have an influence on eating. The first aspect is a 36 amino acid peptide transmitter known as the NPY. The NPY contains five different receptors; Y1, Y2, Y4, Y5, and Y6. Y2 is specifically geared towards memory. Y5 pertains to eating. Y6 is found in some animals, but not really found in humans. The Y1 and Y5 receptors are specifically for eating. The more NPY found within the body, the more a person would eat. A question, which was presented in this presentation, was if certain areas of the brain could be identified as being responsive to the metabolic action of the NPY. In order to study this idea, and experiment was performed where NPY was injected directly into different target areas. From this, it was shown that there were specific areas of the brain that responded to the levels of NPY differently.

The second aspect of this presentation was the 5-HT Receptor Antagonist. These antagonists are capable of decreasing the effect of NPY levels within the body. One antagonist, in particular, was shown to have a great effect on NPY effect, known as DOI. It was found that DOI blocks NYP responses inside the brain. One specific part of DOI was signaled out as being responsible for the blockage of NPY, known as 2A. Even though the DOI is able to decrease the sense of hunger, it is not used in humans because it causes very bad