Scots university leads £7.6m appetite study

A MAJOR study is to be undertaken to determine what makes people feel hungry or full.

The 7.6 million European Union-funded project, Full4Health, will last five years and will bring together scientists from 19 European laboratories.

The research, co-ordinated by the University of Aberdeen Rowett Institute for Nutrition and Health, will examine how the body responds to food at different stages in our lives.

It aims to help people learn more about the relationship between food, the gut and the brain, and how this regulates feelings of hunger or fullness.

Professor Julian Mercer, head of obesity and metabolic health at the university, hopes that the study will help with the problem of over-consumption leading to obesity, as well as under-nutrition in the elderly or those recovering from illness.

The study will examine the body's responses to food in both those lean and overweight in four age groups: children; teenagers; adults and the elderly.

Prof Mercer said: "We need to understand how responses to food differ across the age groups. This is the first study of its kind that we know of to take this approach."