ArticleNature communications2015
Insulin enhances striatal dopamine release by activating cholinergic interneurons and thereby signals reward.
Article in Nature communications, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 156 papers.
What it found
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The trial behind it
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Who cites it
156 citing papers in PubMed, 270 citations in OpenAlex.
- Metabolic and neural responses to ultraprocessed foods: a randomized, controlled, crossover study.Nature metabolism · 2026Trial
- The influence of insulin on anticipation and consummatory reward to food intake: A functional imaging study on healthy normal weight and overweight subjects employing intranasal insulin delivery.Human brain mapping · 2022Trial
- Sex differences in central insulin action: Effect of intranasal insulin on neural food cue reactivity in adults with normal weight and overweight.International journal of obesity (2005) · 2022Trial
- The response to prolonged fasting in hypothalamic serotonin transporter availability is blunted in obesity.Metabolism: clinical and experimental · 2021Trial
- Diets Varying in Carbohydrate Content Differentially Alter Brain Activity in Homeostatic and Reward Regions in Adults.The Journal of nutrition · 2021Trial
- Utility of Neuronal-Derived Exosomes to Examine Molecular Mechanisms That Affect Motor Function in Patients With Parkinson Disease: A Secondary Analysis of the Exenatide-PD Trial.JAMA neurology · 2019Trial
- Brain and behavioral correlates of insulin resistance in youth with depression and obesity.Hormones and behavior · 2019Trial
- Trial
- Reduction of smoking urges with intranasal insulin: a randomized, crossover, placebo-controlled clinical trial.Molecular psychiatry · 2017Trial
- Beyond Pleasure: Unraveling the Multifaceted Role of Dopamine in Obesity and Metabolic Regulation.Current obesity reports · 2026Review
- Spatial correspondence between altered brain function and normative neurotransmitter density maps in Type 1 diabetes mellitus.Journal of endocrinological investigation · 2026Article
- 5-HT4 Receptor Ligand RS67333 Modulates Striatal Acetylcholine and Dopamine Release via the Inhibition of Acetylcholinesterase.ACS chemical neuroscience · 2026Article
- Prenatal metabolic adversity reprograms insulin-responsive transcription in the developing nucleus accumbens.Molecular metabolism · 2026Article
- Blunted anticipation, but not consummation, of food rewards in depression.Cell reports. Medicine · 2026Article
- From brain bioenergetics to hypothalamic glucoregulation: A shared-systems hypothesis for intrinsic dysglycemia in schizophrenia.Reviews in endocrine & metabolic disorders · 2026Review
- Narrative Review "Dual Frontiers in Neurodegeneration: Pharmacological Synergies and Divergences in Parkinson's Disease and Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus".Cellular and molecular neurobiology · 2026Review
- Metabolism and the Mind: Investigating the Link Between Glucose Control and Reinforcement Learning in Humans.Biological psychiatry global open science · 2026Article
- High-frequency axonal bursts mediate bidirectional modulation of dopamine signaling by nicotinic receptors.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Exercise modulates food reward: neurobiological mechanisms and implications for weight management.Frontiers in nutrition · 2026Review
- Long-term sugar consumption alters extracellular dopamine and acetylcholine levels in the nucleus accumbens shell.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2026Article
96 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
12 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Insulin activates insulin receptors (InsRs) in the hypothalamus to signal satiety after a meal. However, the rising incidence of obesity, which results in chronically elevated insulin levels, implies that insulin may also act in brain centres that regulate motivation and reward. We report here that insulin can amplify action potential-dependent dopamine (DA) release in the nucleus accumbens (NAc) and caudate-putamen through an indirect mechanism that involves striatal cholinergic interneurons that express InsRs. Furthermore, two different chronic diet manipulations in rats, food restriction (FR) and an obesogenic (OB) diet, oppositely alter the sensitivity of striatal DA release to insulin, with enhanced responsiveness in FR, but loss of responsiveness in OB. Behavioural studies show that intact insulin levels in the NAc shell are necessary for acquisition of preference for the flavour of a paired glucose solution. Together, these data imply that striatal insulin signalling enhances DA release to influence food choices.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.