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Monell Chemical Senses Center

·January 15, 2025·5 min read

Food Memories Drive Overeating and Obesity

A new study identifies neurons in the hippocampus that store food-specific memories, directly influencing overeating and body weight. These neurons, which encode memories for sugar and fat, act as "memory traces" that drive dietary behavior and metabolism.

Featured Neuroscience

·May 19, 2024·6 min read

Sweet Taste Receptors Play Role in Glucose Metabolism

The sweet taste receptor, TAS1R2-TAS1R3, plays a dual role in regulating glucose metabolism. Stimulating this receptor with sucralose accelerates insulin release, while inhibiting it with lactisole slows insulin release. This finding suggests that targeting TAS1R2-TAS1R3 could offer new therapeutic avenues for managing metabolic disorders like diabetes.

Featured Neuroscience

·January 18, 2024·5 min read

Gut-Brain Network for Sugar and Fat Cravings Discovered

Researchers identified distinct neural pathways in the brain for fat and sugar cravings. This research reveals that separate circuits in the vagus nerve, originating in the gut, communicate information about consumed fats and sugars to the brain, triggering dopamine release in the brain's reward center.

Featured Neuroscience

·September 2, 2023·7 min read

AI Cracks the Code on Odor Perception

Researchers unravel the mysteries of smell using machine learning. Their AI model has achieved human-level skill in describing how certain chemicals will smell, closing a critical gap in the scientific understanding of olfaction.

Featured Genetics Neuroscience

·August 24, 2023·5 min read

The Bitter Truth: Illness, Inflammation, and the Genetic Code of Taste

A new study delves into the relationship between taste perception and immune function, focusing on the bitter taste experienced during illness. The study identified that inflammation elevates aversion to bitter tastes, a change stemming from the taste buds.

Featured Neuroscience

·May 17, 2021·5 min read

Insulin Is Necessary For Repairing Olfactory Neurons

Following injury or damage, insulin plays a key role in the maturation and regeneration of immature olfactory sensory neurons.

Featured Genetics Neuroscience

·April 30, 2019·5 min read

Do you smell what I smell?

Small changes in a single olfactory receptor gene can affect how strong, or how pleasant, a person finds a particular odor.

This shows a person licking an ice cream

Featured Neuroscience

·April 24, 2019·4 min read

Smelling with your tongue: Functional olfactory receptors in human taste center identified

Functional olfactory receptors have been identified in human taste cells. The findings suggest olfactory receptors play a role in the taste system by interacting with taste receptors on the tongue. The brain, researchers say, combines input from taste, smell and other senses to create a multi-modal sensation of flavor.

Featured Neuroscience Open Neuroscience Articles

·September 24, 2018·4 min read

Know Someone Sick? Your Own Smell Might Give it Away

Researchers report the personal odors of healthy animals change when they share an environment with a sick animal. The findings suggest these changes could impact social contact and patterns of disease spread.