The evidence is convergent. Multiple independent sources reach the same conclusion, the underlying mechanism is well-characterized, and even the field's most cautious voices treat it as worth doing.
And what the Bohorquez lab has shown is that these neuropod cells are part of network. They're sensing several different nutrients, but in particular, when they sense sugar, they send signals in the form of electrical firing up to the brain in ways that trigger activation of other brain stations that cause you to seek out more of that particular food.
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And again, when I say gut, I don't just mean in the stomach. There are actually neurons, neuropod cells, further down your digestive tract which are signaling to your brain about the presence of sweet foods, as well as foods such as amino acid rich foods or foods that are rich in particular types of fatty acids signaling up to your brain and causing you to seek out more of those foods or to consume more of those foods.
So this is an incredible system of gut-brain signaling, and it is but one system of gut-brain signaling. It turns out it's the system that we know the most about at this point in time.
The neuropod cells signal by way of a particular branch of the vagus through that nodose ganglion that we talked about before and through a number of different stations in the brain stem, eventually cause the release of the neuromodulator dopamine. Dopamine is often associated with a sense of pleasure and reward but it is more appropriately thought of as a neuromodulator that impacts motivation, craving, and pursuit.
They do seem to be part of the sweet sensing system. And even though I'm focusing on this particular example, they represent a really nice example of how a particular set of neuro cells in our gut is collecting information about what is there at a particular location in the gut, and sending that information up to our brain.
More recent experiments involve selective silencing of these neuropod cells. And there have been a lot of different derivations of this sort of thing, but the takeaway from it is that our experience of and our desire for particular foods has everything to do with how those foods taste.
and that sweet taste is part of the motivator but what you're saying is that as the ice cream enters the gut there are neurop pod cells there that are also sensing the sugar and signaling to the brain and the brain is responding to pursue more of that sweet containing substance that's correct and it's happening below our awareness it is independent from the Sweet Taste of the ice cream correct the the conscious sweet taste