Did you know that eating foods like burgers and candy not only has an impact on your weight but also affects your brain? In fact, a high-sugar, high-fat diet could have serious consequences on your nervous system.
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Junk food, a healthy brain's worst enemy
Junk food has serious effects on our brains, according to a study conducted by Yale University. While other studies had already demonstrated that there's a link between obesity and eating junk food, this is the first study to bring to light the impact a poor diet can make on the brain.
A protein called UCP2 can cause inflammation of the hypothalamus as early as three days after you start eating a high-carbohydrate and high-fat diet. This area of the brain is important in that it regulates appetite and how we manage fear. When this part of the brain is damaged, we tend to be less resistant to weight gain and eat more.
The study not only illustrates how high-fat diets affect us physically, but conveys how an unhealthy diet can alter our food intake neurologically.
Can it cause Alzheimer's?
The aim of this study was to prove that eating junk food causes physical and neurological changes, as well as to understand the development of other neurological disorders, such as Alzheimer's.
Further research on this subject could actually reveal a link between the physiological mechanisms that regulate the amount of food we eat and Alzheimer's disease. As a reminder, Alzheimer's is a neurological disorder caused by changes in brain cells. Also worth noting, it's been proven that these mutations are more common in people who suffer from obesity.
TL;DR: Keep your intake of fatty and sugary food to a minimum if you want to keep your weight and brain healthy.
