In a recent article published by Science Daily says how researchers at Georgetown University Medical Center have discovered how a gene mutation can be responsible for obesity. The team at Georgetown found that a mutation to BDNF (brain derived nuerotrophic factor) gene doesn’t allow leptin and insulin to properly reach the brain. These are two hormones that are release once the body has been satisfied by the consumption of food.
Until this study was performed, researchers were clueless as to which gene controls the secretion of leptin and insulin. Even though the gene linked to obesity has been discovered, there is no cure to repair the BDNF gene. Researchers are currently experimenting different ways to repair this gene and cure adult obesity.
In America, it seems like a major issue that is plaguing us with worry is obesity. Some of the lucky ones with a faster metabolism, allowing digestion to occur more quickly, results in a more or less slimmer figure. But has anyone ever given thought that it might be the other way around also?
Baoji Xu, Ph.D. has. As an associate professor of pharmacology and physiology at Georgetown University Medical Center, Xu has been researching a single gene mutation that occurs within the brain-derived neurotrophic factor gene (Bdnf). With this mutation, the brain does not receive the chemical signals needed, by leptin and insulin, to turn on the mechanism that suppresses the desire to keep eating, and then tells the body that it is now full. Without these signals transmitted, individuals will just keep eating until they become obese and beyond. The can never fully feel satisfied.
Until this study, it was known that the Bdnf gene has some correlation with controlling body weight. After this study, published on the Nature’s Medicine website, now we know why. Bdnf synthesis is stimulated with leptin and insulin in the dendrites on neuroglia to get their chemical message across the synapses to adjacent neurons. With the mutation of the Bdnf gene, the chemical signals cannot be passed on through the neurons, and one’s hunger will never be suppressed.
