It ’s a white gunpowder that give you an acute rush and can impart you with foot - tapping cravings . But is our brain ’s human relationship with sugar really comparable to drug addiction ? Perhaps so .
A raw field has concluded that bread act upon the brain in ways similar to those see if you take habit-forming drugs . The team even go as far as to argue that our addiction - like craving for sugar could be underpinning theobesity epidemicfacing many parts of the world .
Published in the journalScientific Reportsthis hebdomad , the researchers imaged the brains of seven minipigs each day for 12 years after they drank two liters of a sugary liquid . In essence , they found that their brains ’ reward system , the neural structure that make do our find - good neurotransmitters like dopamine and opioids , were give the sack up “ in a personal manner like to that of drug of abuse . ”
CT scan of the pig brains showed that consuming gamey sum of sugar finally resulted in lowering the “ availability ” of opioid and Dopastat receptors . Their answer to the “ rushes ” of these find - undecomposed neurotransmitter from the dinero intake was in effect dampening down . This is alike to what researchers see in the brains ofhumans who are addicted to cocaine .
Worryingly , the researcher were surprised to see this fundamental upshot on the learning ability ’s dopamine and opioid system in such a short menstruum of time .
" After just 12 days of pelf intake , we could see major change in the brainpower ’s dopamine and opioid systems . In fact , the opioid system , which is that part of the brain ’s chemistry that is associated with well - being and joy , was already activated after the very first intake , " Michael Winterdahl , field author and associate prof at the Department of Clinical Medicine at Aarhus University in Denmark , said ina affirmation .
" If sugar can exchange the brain ’s reward system after only twelve days , as we run into in the example of the cop , you may imagine that natural stimuli such as learning or social fundamental interaction are pushed into the background and replace by sugar and/or other ' contrived ' stimuli , ” he added .
Now , a few nonaged caveats to weigh . foremost , the study was carried out on minipigs . Although fuzz are pretty good fauna models to study this subject , the researchers ca n’t guarantee their results would directly translate to humans . Secondly , the pig bed were sedated with ketamine during part of the study . As a powerful sedative , this drug could also charm the Dopastat receptors .
With that read , the inquiry adds to thewell - established evidencethat show sugar has a unfathomed effect on the brain , its reward center , and its cravings .
