The Neurobiology of the Obesity Epidemic

I recently read an interesting review paper by Dr. Edmund T. Rolls titled "Taste, olfactory and food texture reward processing in the brain and the control of appetite" that I'll discuss in this post (1).  Dr. Rolls is a prolific neuroscience researcher at Oxford who focuses on "the brain mechanisms of perception, memory, emotion and feeding, and thus of perceptual, memory, emotional and appetite disorders."  His website is here.

The first half of the paper is technical and discusses some of Dr. Rolls' findings on how specific brain areas process sensory and reward information, and how individual neurons can integrate multiple sensory signals during this process.  I recommend reading it if you have the background and interest, but I'm not going to cover it here.  The second half of the paper is an attempt to explain the obesity epidemic based on what he knows about the brain and other aspects of human biology.

Read more »

Are Animal Crackers Paleo?

Warning -- Satire -- April Fool's Post

Every child loves animal crackers, those sweet and crunchy animal-shaped biscuits.  But are they compatible with a Paleo diet?  Some people might think they already know the answer, but consider this: our ancestors evolved on the African savanna, eating the plants and animals found there.  Inside each box of animal crackers is an assortment of tiny savanna creatures such as giraffes and elephants.

To get to the bottom of this, I interviewed Robert Pearson, CEO of Animal Cracker Products Inc., who explained to me how these crackers are made.

Read more »