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Despite growing literature on neural food cue responsivity in obesity, little is known about how the brain processes food cues following partial sleep deprivation and whether short sleep leads to changes similar to those observed in obesity. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to test the hypothesis that short sleep leads to increased reward-related and decreased inhibitory control-related processing of food cues.In a within-subject design, 30 participants (22 female, mean age = 36.7 standard deviation = 10.8 years, body mass index range 20.4-40.7) completed four nights of 6 hours/night time-in-bed (TIB; short sleep) and four nights of 9 hours/night TIB (long sleep) in random counterbalanced order in their home environments. Following each sleep condition, participants completed an fMRI scan while viewing food and nonfood images.A priori region of interest analyses revealed increased activity to food in short versus long sleep in regions of reward processing (eg, nucleus accumbens/putamen) and sensory/motor signaling (ie, right paracentral lobule, an effect that was most pronounced in obese individuals). Contrary to the hypothesis, whole brain analyses indicated greater food cue responsivity during short sleep in an inhibitory control region (right inferior frontal gyrus) and ventral medial prefrontal cortex, which has been implicated in reward coding and decision-making (false discovery rate corrected q = 0.05).These findings suggest that sleep restriction leads to both greater reward and control processing in response to food cues. Future research is needed to understand the dynamic functional connectivity between these regions during short sleep and whether the interplay between these neural processes determines if one succumbs to food temptation., (© Sleep Research Society 2017. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Sleep Research Society. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail journals.permissions@oup.com.)

As many people struggle with maintenance of weight loss, the study of successful weight loss maintainers (SWLM) can yield important insights into factors contributing to weight loss maintenance. However, little research has examined how SWLM differ from people who are obese or normal weight (NW) in brain response to orosensory stimulation. The goal of this study was to determine if SWLM exhibit different brain responses to orosensory stimulation. Brain response to 1-min orosensory stimulation with a lemon lollipop was assessed using functional magnetic resonance imaging among 49 participants, including SWLM (n = 17), NW (n = 18), and obese (n = 14) controls. Significant brain responses were observed in nine brain regions, including the bilateral insula, left inferior frontal gyrus, left putamen, and other sensory regions. All regions also exhibited significant attenuation of this response over 1 min. The SWLM exhibited greater response compared with the other groups in all brain regions. Findings suggest that the response to orosensory stimulation peaks within 40 s and attenuates significantly between 40 and 60 s in regions associated with sensation, reward, and inhibitory control. Greater reactivity among the SWLM suggests that greater sensory reactivity to orosensory stimulation, increased anticipated reward, and subsequently greater inhibitory processing are associated with weight loss maintenance.