Brain movement in children may help reduce the risk of obesity

the brain consumes a lot of energy during a specific period of childhood development, during which time weight gain becomes slower. People get fat because their energy intake is greater than their consumption, leading U.S. researchers to suggest a link between the brain's energy consumption and the risk of obesity.
, Northwestern University and other institutions recently published a paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences to make this point. If further research supports this view, they say, it suggests that early childhood education, in addition to the known benefits, can also bring "unintended benefits" that increase brain energy consumption and reduce the risk of obesity.
previous studies have found that for five-year-olds, their brains consume almost half of the body's energy. At the same time, the younger age group, which requires more energy for brain development, is also a period of slower weight gain in children, and as children get older, the energy required for brain development decreases and the rate of weight growth accelerates accordingly.
retrospective analysis, the researchers concluded that changes in the energy needed for brain development in children may influence the patterns of physical energy consumption and weight gain in children. Christophe Kuzava, a researcher at Northwestern University and one of the authors of the paper, said little is known about individual differences in brain energy consumption in different children. Quantifying patterns of change in the energy needed for a child's brain may help develop targeted early education systems that promote brain development and reduce the risk of obesity.