In Rats, High-Fat Diet Damages Short-Term Memory

In lab rats, a high-fat, fast-food diet will make you stupid.

Researchers have given Flickr one more reason to ban photos like this one from the Erotic Food group. Not to worry, we would never feature burgers as an aphrodisiac, here at AOC. If we sneak out for a burger, you’ll never know about it.

Scientists at Oxford University found that a high-fat diet damaged the short-term memory of rats in less than 10 days. After just four days, the muscles of high-fat, junk-food-fed rats were less able to use oxygen required for exercise.

This condition caused hearts to enlarge.

Low-fat diet rats performed swimmingly, although the fat content of their diet was an abnormally low 7.5%. The research would have been more interesting with a comparative diet of 20% fat, an amount challenging but attainable, when sufficiently inspired. via Telegraph UK