Can thinking about food make us store energy in our muscles?

New research from Japan suggests that just thinking about food can make our muscles take up glucose for use as an energy source just by thinking about it. The study was conducted with mice but the researchers think that the results will be transferable to humans.

The researchers in Japan investigated a protein known as orexin-A, which is activated in the brain by physical activity, moods and thoughts. Orexin-A was injected into the brians of the mice used and this caused a message to be sent to the muscles (skeletal muscle) which then directed the muscle to fuel up with glucose.

We do know that even just thinking about exercise can cause the body to start preparing for an exercise session - e.g. an increase in heart rate may be seen, and during visualisation in athletes muscles have shown the same activity that is seen in 'real' movements, so it is definately possible that our thoughts impact our bodily function.

Although it is very early to tell if this will help in humans it does indicate that it could help in terms of carb (glucose) use in athletes preparing for events, and in weight management medications. Stay tuned....