Eating Behavior May Be Influenced By Dining Companions

February 10, 2012 | by

A new study published in the online journal PLoS ONE demonstrates that diners mimic the eating patterns of their dining companions, matching them bite-for-bite [1]. The researchers studied pairs of young women who did not know one another, and found that they influenced each other with regard to eating patterns. Particularly within the first ten minutes of dining together, the women tended to mimic each other, taking bites of food within five seconds of one another.

Women eating saladImage credit: Women eating salad via Shutterstock

A New Flavour of Journal is Coming to BioMed Central

May 5, 2011 | by

Today more than ever, science is playing a pivotal role in food and cooking as the worlds of the laboratory and the kitchen come closter together. A perfect example of this in today’s culture is the Food Network show Good Eats with Alton Brown along with websites like the Science of Cooking, Molecular Recipies, Modernist Cuisine and the Molecular Gastronomy Network.

The result of this movement to bring science into the kitchen is Molecular Gastronomy, the application of biological and chemical knowledge to cooking. Molecular Gastronomy is a discipline practiced by both scientists and food professionals to study the physical and chemical processes that occur while cooking.

Biomed Central Flavour

Is Junk Food Addictive?

June 3, 2010 | by
ResearchBlogging.org

In a recent paper in Nature Neuroscience, two researchers at the Scripps Research Institute in Florida report that obese rats with extended access to what they deemed “palatable food” — bacon, sausage, cheesecake, pound cake, frosting and chocolate — exhibited compulsive like eating behavior, much like rats with extended access to cocaine or heroin [1]. This compulsive eating meant that they continued eating despite negative ramifications, in this case a flash of light signaling an oncoming electric shock administered to their foot. This lack of control over behavior with known negative consequences is a hallmark of both drug addiction and obesity. The investigators found that just like drug addicted rats, these obese rats had fewer striatal (a region of the forebrain) dopamine D2 receptors; this is responsible for the observed dampening of their neural reward responses to the food, which caused them to continue to eat, seeking that elusive high.

Health Highlights – January 29th, 2010

January 29, 2010 | by

Health Highlights is a biweekly summary of particularly interesting articles from credible sources of health and medical information that we follow & read. For a complete list of recommeded sources, see our links page.

Health Highlights

NIH Increases Support for High-risk Large-impact Biomedical Research

October 2, 2008 | by

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced last week that it has increased support for high-risk, large-impact research by awarding 16 investigators the Pioneer Award; 2.5 million for each investigator over five years to pursue research in a variety of areas, including embroyonic development, autism, prions (responsible for the formation of amyloid plaques that lead to neurodegeneration) and malaria [1].

The NIH Director’s Pioneer Award is a high-risk research initiative desiged to [2]:

… support individual scientists of exceptional creativity who propose pioneering — and possibly transforming approaches — to major challenges in biomedical and behavioral research.

First announced in 2004, 9 awards were presented in September 2004, 13 awards each were made in 2005 and 2006, and 12 awards were presented last year.