Gut microbes and food reward motivation

Food reward alterations are considered to be major drivers of body weight gain and obesity. Obesity is characterised by inappropriate behavioural components of the reward system, as the hypo-functioning of dopaminergic pathways leads to overconsumption of food to compensate and reach the same pleasure. It has been shown that gut microbes can alter hedonic feeding. Therefore, in this study, the role of the gut microbiota in the wanting and learning components of the food reward was assessed through behavioural tests on lean mice and mice with diet-induced obesity, as well as the recipients of their respective gut microbiota.