减肥新理论：不良的饮食习惯已致大脑受损
The New Theory On Weight Loss: Your Bad Diet Has Damaged Your Brain
You’ve tried and tried to lose weight, but it just doesn’t happen. Or you lose a bit, then gain it back with a vengeance. Sound familiar?
一次又一次地试着减肥，就是没有效果。好不容易体重轻了一点，过不了多久又反弹回来了。是不是觉得这种情况很熟悉？
Recently, while reporting a story on 3 new supplements studied for weight loss, I had the opportunity to speak with nationally known obesity expert Louis Aronne, M.D., Director of the Comprehensive Weight-Control Program at New York-Presbyterian Hospital
最近，我在报道三种研究中的新的减肥补充剂时，借机采访了全国知名肥胖症专家、医学博士路易·阿龙内（Louis Aronne）。阿龙内是纽约-长老会医院/威尔·康奈尔医疗中心（New York-Presbyterian Hospital /Weill Cornell Medical Center）“综合体重控制项目”（Comprehensive Weight-Control Program）的负责人。
According to Aronne, scientists are finally finding answers to the mystery that has stumped them for so long: Why do some people seem to find it impossible to lose weight, despite numerous serious attempts to get slim using diets and exercise?
为什么有些人又节食、又锻炼，使尽了浑身解数，体重就是减不下来？这是困扰科学家多年的问题。阿龙内表示，如今这一问题终于快要到答案了。
And what they’ve discovered might surprise you: Years of eating – and overeating – the typical American diet actually changes the brain. More specifically, it damages the signaling pathways in the hypothalamus, the part of the brain that regulates metabolism.
科学家的发现或许会让你大吃一惊：长年的饮食习惯——以及过度饱食——典型的美国式饮食习惯实际上改变了大脑。具体说来，它使下丘脑的信号通路受损，而下丘脑是大脑调节新陈代谢的中枢。
“The evidence is quite convincing – eating fattening foods causes inflammatory cells to go into the hypothalamus, ” explains Aronne. “This overloads the neurons and causes neurological damage.”
“这个理论的证据非常有力——摄入能增肥的食品会使炎症细胞进入下丘脑，”阿龙内表示。“这使神经元负荷过大，导致神经损伤。”
A groundbreaking study in the British Journal of Nutrition published in February, 2013 is one example of the kind of high-quality, on-target research that’s proving the theory of hypothalamic damage and thus paving the way to new weight loss strategies, Aronne says.
据阿龙内说，今年2月，《英国营养学杂志》（British Journal of Nutrition）发布了一项开创性的研究，这是一项典型的、具有针对性的高质量研究，证明了下丘脑损伤理论，为减肥新策略的诞生铺平了道路。
A team of scientists at the University of Liverpool analyzed a body of research that included studies of different weight loss diets. What they found was that a diet high in saturated fat and simple carbohydrates sets in motion a chain reaction of “metabolic dysfunction” involving the appetite regulating hormones leptin and ghrelin. (Leptin’s job is to suppress appetite, ghrelin’s to increases it.) In addition, a fatty high-carb diet resulted in “alterations in structural plasticity” – i.e. brain changes.
利物浦大学（University of Liverpool）的一个科学家团队分析了一系列对减肥食谱的研究。他们发现，饱和脂肪和简单碳水化合物含量高的饮食会导致“代谢功能障碍”的连锁反应，其中涉及到两种食欲调节激素的活动，这两种激素分别是瘦素（leptin）和胃饥饿素（ghrelin）。（瘦素的作用是抑制食欲，胃饥饿素则刺激食欲）除此之外，高脂肪、高碳水化合物的饮食还会导致“结构塑性的改变”——也就是大脑结构的变化。
Over time, consuming too many calories from fat and simple sugars damages the nerves that conduct signals through the hypothalamus, affecting the function of leptin and ghrelin, and thus the body’s ability to regulate weight and metabolism, says Aronne. “Because of this damage, the signals don’t get through about how much fat is stored.”
阿龙内表示，从高脂肪、高单糖的饮食中摄入过多的热量，长此以往，会损伤下丘脑中传递信号的神经，影响瘦素和胃饥饿素的功能，从而影响人体调节体重和新陈代谢的能力。“由于神经损伤，关于身体脂肪储量的信号将无法有效传递。”
In other words, your brain has gone haywire and you can no longer trust the messages it’s sending you about appetite, hunger, and fullness. “It’s like your gas gauge points to empty
all the time, whether or not the tank is full, ” says Aronne. “So you keep stopping for gas, and then eventually you start filling up gas cans and storing them in the back of your car because you’re so convinced you could run out of gas at any moment.”
换句话说，大脑已经一片混乱，它给你发送的任何关于食欲、空腹感和饱腹感的信号都无足采信。“好比你的汽油表指针一直莫名其妙地指向零，不管油箱是不是满的，”阿龙内表示。“于是你总是停下车来加油，结果到了最后，你干脆把油桶注满，并在后备箱里屯一些，因为你觉得油箱里的油随时都会耗完。”
So What Does Work for Weight Loss?
那么，怎样做才能有效减肥呢？
增肥美食和减肥食谱
Change your diet, and change it fast. “It’s about biology, ” Aronne is fond of saying. While some damage to the hypothalamus may be permanent, it’s possible to reverse much of it. “If less fatty food comes in, it reduces the rate of damage, ” he explains, noting that it doesn’t matter so much which specific diet you follow, as long as it’s one that cuts calories, reduces fat, and reduces simple carbohydrates.
改变饮食习惯，而且要迅速行动。“这涉及到生物学理论，”阿龙内总是把这句话挂在嘴边。虽然下丘脑受到的损伤有些可能是永久性的，但很大一部分损伤还是有可能复原。“只要减少脂肪的摄入，就能减缓大脑受损的速度，”阿龙内解释道。他还指出，遵守什么样的食谱并不是特别的重要，重要的是你所遵守的食谱要有助于减少热量、脂肪和简单碳水化合物的摄入。
Of course, there are lots of trendy diets, such as the Fast Diet currently making headlines. And there’s no reason not to try a new approach and see if it works better for you than the ones you’ve tried in the past. But work with your body, not against it, Aronne says, and the weight will come off much faster.