Los Angeles – All parents are aware that drugs and alcohol can have a negative impact on their child’s developing brain, but a new study shows that mothers and fathers around the world are more concerned about the effects of a candy bar than a can of beer. You might want to start thinking that it’s just as bad as . A rodent study conducted at the University of Southern California found that rats fed a diet high in fat and sugar during adolescence suffered long-term memory problems into adulthood.
Overall, the study authors believe these findings indicate that a diet full of junk food can disrupt memory abilities in teens over the long term, just as it did in rats. There is.
“What we found in this paper, as well as in our other recent studies, is that if these rats grow up eating junk food, they have persistent memory deficits,” said Scott Kanosky. says. In a media release, USC Dornsaif, professor of biological sciences in the College of Letters, Arts and Sciences. “Unfortunately, these effects continue well into adulthood if we simply feed them a healthy diet.”
In conducting their research, Professor Kanosky and postdoctoral researcher Anna Hayes considered the following: Previous research It revealed a link between poor diet and Alzheimer’s disease. People diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease tend to have reduced levels of a neurotransmitter called . acetylcholine in their brains. That neurotransmitter is essential for memory and many other functions such as learning, attention, alertness, and involuntary muscle movements.
So the researchers wondered what that might mean for young people who eat similar fatty, sweet Western-style diets, especially when their brains are undergoing significant development during adolescence. thought. Researchers were able to learn more about the important relationship between diet and memory by tracking the effects of diet on acetylcholine levels in rodents and by subjecting rats to memory tests.
Next, the study authors tracked acetylcholine levels in a control group of rats that ate a sweet, fatty diet. They analyzed the brain’s response to specific tasks aimed at testing memory. From there, the researchers analyzed the rats’ postmortem brains for signs of disturbances in acetylcholine levels.
The memory test used in this study involved having rats explore new objects in different locations. Then, a few days later, the researchers reintroduced the rats to a nearly identical scene, except one new object was added. Rats that had been eating junk food showed signs of not remembering which objects they had seen before and where. On the other hand, people in the control group were more familiar with their surroundings.
“Acetylcholine signaling is a mechanism that helps humans encode and remember past events, similar to ‘episodic memory’ that allows us to recall past events,” Hayes explains. “That signal doesn’t seem to occur in animals raised on a diet high in fat or sugar.”
Professor Kanosky emphasizes that adolescence is a very sensitive time for the brain, as important developmental changes occur.
“I don’t know how to say this without sounding hopelessly depressed like Cassandra. But unfortunately, some of the things in childhood that could be easily reversed in adulthood are If it happens, it will be difficult to recover from,” he added.
In conclusion, the research team adds that there is some hope for the intervention. Professor Kanosky said that in another round of research, the study authors investigated whether memory deficits in rats raised on a junk food diet could be reversed with drug therapy that induces the release of acetylcholine. They used two of his drugs for this purpose: PNU-282987 and carbacholfound that administering these treatments directly to the hippocampus, a brain region responsible for memory that is often impaired by Alzheimer’s disease, restored the rats’ memory abilities.
However, Professor Kanosky stresses that without such specific medical intervention, further research is needed to understand how memory impairments caused by junk food in adolescence can be reversed.
You can read the full study here herewas announced in Brain behavior and immunity.