Can a high-fat diet affect our smell? A new study carried out by Florida State University (USA) and published in The Journal of Neuroscience suggests this.
For their experiment, the researchers used mice that were fed a high-fat diet at all meals for six months , as well as a control group fed rodent food. After this period, the experts found that the obese mice were slower to establish a relationship between smell and reward (one of the tests of the experiment), compared to the mice fed with food.
In addition, they found that the first group of mice, the mice that had been fed fat, only had 50% of the brain cells responsible for encoding the scent signals , which led to a loss of consciousness. smell.
“Because smell is linked to eating behavior to guide food choices, its potential dysfunction during obesity could evoke a positive feedback loop to perpetuate poor eating behaviors,” says Nicolas Thiebaud, leader of the study.
Why is there a loss of smell from eating fat ? “Our results show an increase in cell death and microglial cell infiltration, suggesting that a high-fat diet leads to an increase in the inflammatory state of the olfactory mucosa that explains the decrease in sensory neurons. olfactory ”, clarifies Thiebaud.
