Post: High-Fat Diet Triggers Memory Decline Within Days

Summary: A new study shows that just three days of a high-fat diet can cause memory impairments and brain inflammation in older adults, independent of obesity. Researchers compared young and old rats fed a diet with 60% of calories from fat and found that only the older rats showed cognitive decline.

While metabolic and gut health changes took months to appear, memory deficits emerged quickly in the aged brains. The findings suggest that diet-related brain inflammation is not solely driven by obesity but occurs rapidly with unhealthy eating.

Key Facts: Just three days of a high-fat diet caused memory impairment in older rats.

Brain inflammation occurred before metabolic and gut health changes.

Young rats on the same diet did not experience cognitive decline.

Source: Ohio State University

Just a few days of eating a diet high in saturated fat could be enough to cause memory problems and related brain inflammation in older adults, a new study in rats suggests.

Researchers fed separate groups of young and old rats the high-fat diet for three days or for three months to compare how quickly changes happen in the brain versus the rest of the body when eating an unhealthy diet. Young rats’ memory and behavior and brain tissue remained unaffected by the fatty food. Credit: Neuroscience News As expected based on previous diabetes and obesity research, eating fatty foods for three months led to metabolic problems, gut inflammation and dramatic shifts in gut bacteria in all rats compared to those that ate normal chow, while just three days of high fat caused no major metabolic or gut changes.

When it came to changes in the brain, however, researchers found that only older rats – whether they were on the high-fat diet for three months or only three days – performed poorly on memory tests and showed negative inflammatory changes in the brain.The results dispel the idea that diet-related inflammation in the aging brain is driven by obesity, said senior study author Ruth Barrientos, an investigator in the Institute for Behavioral Medicine Research at The Ohio State University. Most research on the effects of […]

High-Fat Diet Triggers Memory Decline Within Days