Exercise and eating have a fraught, unsettled relationship with each other. Workouts can blunt or boost appetites. People who start an exercise program often overeat and gain weight — and yet studies and lived experience demonstrate that regular exercise is needed to avoid regaining the weight lost during a successful diet. Intrigued by these contradictory outcomes, researchers at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, along with colleagues from other institutions, ran an experiment on the melanocortin circuit, a brain network in the hypothalamus known to be involved in metabolism. The resulting study, published in December in Molecular Metabolism, suggests that intense exercise might change the workings of certain neurons in ways that could have beneficial effects on appetite and metabolism.
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