The neurobiology of feeding, addiction, and motivation.
Dopamine neurons in the ventral tegmental area stained with anti-tyrosine hydroxylase antibody (blue). The orange neuron has been filled with neurobiotin during an electrophysiological recording.
Our research is focused on how the brain controls appetite and our food choices. In particular, we are interested in how animals – including humans – ensure they get the correct balance of nutrients. We use a range of techniques to try to understand this including animal behavior, electrophysiology, and fluorescence imaging.
To survive animals must acquire energy (i.e. calories) and specific nutrients from their food. We have shown that the brain responds differently when eating an artificial sweetener (that has no calories) than when eating sugar (which has lots of calories). We saw that there was more release of the neurotransmitter dopamine when rats were eating sugar than when they were eating an artificial sweetener. This is important as dopamine is thought to be crucial for wanting food and the motivation to eat
But as well as calories, we also need our food to provide all of the specific nutrients that our bodies need to grow and stay healthy. Protein is of special importance as it is made up of amino acids, many of which we must get from our food to stay alive. Currently, much of our work is focused on how the brain ensures we have enough protein in our diet.
Other strands of ongoing and previous work include looking at other controls of eating, such as portion size, and studying dopamine’s role in drug addiction and signaling negative events.
Our funding is currently from Tromsøforskningsstiftelse (TFS; Tromsø Research Foundation) and The Leverhulme Trust; previous research was supported by BBSRC (Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council), European Commission, and National Institutes of Health.