Caenorhabditis elegansWIKIMEDIA, DAN DICKINSON, GOLDSTEIN LAB, UNC CHAPEL HILL Food restriction boosts associative learning in nematode worms (Caenorhabditis elegans) by decreasing a neuromodulatory metabolite, according to a study published yesterday (August 1) in PLOS Biology.
Eating fewer calories produces numerous health benefits in animal and human models, including expanded longevity and heightened learning. However, it’s unclear whether these outcomes are mechanistically linked. In the current study, researchers sought to determine the molecular underpinnings of enhanced learning following a calorie-restricted diet and whether these same pathways were also responsible for promoting a longer lifespan.
Fasting improved performance in a task that required worms to learn an association between food and the scent of a pungent chemical. Worms who learned this association would choose to inch toward this chemical’s particular scent over alcohol.
The researchers demonstrated that fasting for an hour or a half hour decreases kynurenic acid, a product of the breakdown of L-tryptophan, with more robust effects after a longer ...
