Lose Weight the Marmot Way

Dieting is a royal pain. No matter how many carrots or grapes you eat, you still feel hungry. But what if you could go days, weeks even, without eating and not feel hungry?

All of Hollywood would erupt in excitement.

For yellow-bellied marmots, cat-size rodents, this miraculous ability is part of a normal routine. In a new study, scientists identified a molecule that makes marmots hungry during their hibernation phase.

This molecule, nicknamed AICAR (5-aminoimidazole-4-carboxamide 1 B-D-ribofuranoside if you really want to know), is found in creatures from yeast to humans. Knowing how to manipulate it could open the door for people struggling with obesity and eating disorders.

Marmots (Marmota flaviventris) spend up to seven months out of the year, October to March, hibernating.

Unlike other hibernating animals such as ground squirrels and some bats, these furry critters do not store excess food within a paw’s reach for a mid-hibernation snack, Greg Florant of Colorado State University and head author of the study explained to Discovery News.

Rather, they eat to the point of obesity during the summer. Impressively, they are not plagued by health problems like diabetes, Florant noted.

“Even if they aren’t hibernating, marmots can go for days on end without food,” Florant said.

To test this, the research team woke up hibernating marmots and placed food in front of them. None of the giant rodents moved. Instead, they remained sleepy and utterly uninterested in eating (now if only the mice in my kitchen would do that).

After injecting the mammals with AICAR, however, it was an entirely different story. The animals became alert and started chowing down. The hibernation spell was broken!

After about a week, the marmots returned to their original sleepy state. The study was recently published in the Journal of Experimental Biology.

Now that scientists have successfully induced hunger, the next step is to try the opposite. “We want to make them stop eating during the summer when they would normally eat a lot,” Florant said.

The long term goal, however, is relating this back to humans, Florant said. “I want to identify how neurons in the brain might have to change so we can help humans lose weight or decrease food intake without suffering and without consequences.”

Imagine injecting humans with a molecule that would take away hunger for two to three weeks, Florant hypothesized. If marmots can do this every year, why can’t humans?

Is it possible, however, for humans to completely stop eating for more than a couple of days and just live off body fat? If injected with this molecule, would humans shut down in a way similar to hibernating marmots? These are a few questions scientists need to explore before people get carried away with this fantastic new diet plan.

For now, it’s back to eating carrots and grapes.

Image: Colorado State University