New Clues to Appetite and Aging: Fruit Fly Study
http://neurosciencenews.com/aging-appetite-serotonin-5010/
Do you want to know the secret to living longer? Of course you do! Researchers from the University of Michigan Medical School may have found some important information regarding the aging of fruit flies which could help us find out that secret. These researchers studied the eating patterns and diets of the fruit flies and had some interesting findings regarding how their appetite affected how long the flies lived.
Research found that when the flies became hungry, they were drawn to protein rich foods. After eating these foods, the flies felt satisfied because serotonin was released in the brain as a reward for their behavior. Serotonin is a chemical that creates a sense of pleasure after an organism completes an action and it can be found on neurons in the brain. In the study, the researchers had different groups of fruit flies, flies that were allowed to eat protein, flies that were blocked from eating protein, and flies who had a mixed diet. These researchers found that when the fruit flies satiated their need for protein, they died more quickly than fruit flies that did not eat the protein rich foods. This shows that when the serotonin receptors on the neurons were blocked, the flies lived longer lives.
Why should we care about this study? According to the article, fruit flies and humans serotonin reward system is very similar which means this finding could be a factor of our aging process as well. Even though these findings could be related to humans, the article notes that humans are more complex than fruit flies and may not affect us as much.
This research caught my attention as I was scrolling through the multitude of articles because it was weird to think about how rewards systems in the brains of humans could be very similar to those of a fruit fly. Also, it was interesting to see an article which had some connection to what we were learning about in class and how the information from class related to findings being discovered. For example, in class, we started to learn about how neurons work and what they do that affects our everyday life and in the article it shows how serotonin is found on these neurons and how it affects our body. After reading the article, I would like to know other similarities between the brain of a fruit fly and a human.
Do you want to know the secret to living longer? Of course you do! Researchers from the University of Michigan Medical School may have found some important information regarding the aging of fruit flies which could help us find out that secret. These researchers studied the eating patterns and diets of the fruit flies and had some interesting findings regarding how their appetite affected how long the flies lived.
Research found that when the flies became hungry, they were drawn to protein rich foods. After eating these foods, the flies felt satisfied because serotonin was released in the brain as a reward for their behavior. Serotonin is a chemical that creates a sense of pleasure after an organism completes an action and it can be found on neurons in the brain. In the study, the researchers had different groups of fruit flies, flies that were allowed to eat protein, flies that were blocked from eating protein, and flies who had a mixed diet. These researchers found that when the fruit flies satiated their need for protein, they died more quickly than fruit flies that did not eat the protein rich foods. This shows that when the serotonin receptors on the neurons were blocked, the flies lived longer lives.
Why should we care about this study? According to the article, fruit flies and humans serotonin reward system is very similar which means this finding could be a factor of our aging process as well. Even though these findings could be related to humans, the article notes that humans are more complex than fruit flies and may not affect us as much.
This research caught my attention as I was scrolling through the multitude of articles because it was weird to think about how rewards systems in the brains of humans could be very similar to those of a fruit fly. Also, it was interesting to see an article which had some connection to what we were learning about in class and how the information from class related to findings being discovered. For example, in class, we started to learn about how neurons work and what they do that affects our everyday life and in the article it shows how serotonin is found on these neurons and how it affects our body. After reading the article, I would like to know other similarities between the brain of a fruit fly and a human.
After reading the title of your article, I was also interested in how our brains could be similar to a fruit fly. It was cool to learn that serotonin would release in the flies brain when they were done eating protein rich foods. That does sound similar to humans because many of us like protein such as meats, eggs, milk, nuts, etc. That is a lot of what makes up our diets so if humans had to cut that out of our meals, in order to live longer, we would have a very restrictive diet. Do you think you would cut out proteins if you knew you would live longer? I find it crazy that serotonin releases when we eat, because we think we just eat to live but we must be eating because it gives us pleasure as well. Overall, I thought you did a great job summarizing your article and I really enjoyed reading it!
ReplyDeleteThe part of this article that is most intriguing, and perhaps confusing, is the relationship between aging and serotonin. While serotinin has been known to regulate within the aging process, it would appear the article is suggesting that serotonin levels is are a factor in how long an organism (in this case fruit flies) lives, but I would like to speculate that the lifespan differences could be caused by other factors of the protein enriched foods, and not the serotonin release itself. The reason for this inference being that it would seem unnatural and counter intuitive for the brain to reward something as natural and basic as protein, only to have it have life-shortening effects. However, the other perspective of this could be that perhaps protein is not as necessary in fruit flies as it is to humans, and could function in some way like how high sodium and sugary foods do for human beings by triggering the reward circuit and pleasure centers of the brain. This would require more in depth research on the biology of fruit flies.
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