Dr. Diego Bohórquez

And these transporters depolarize the cell.

And then once glucose gets inside of the cell, glucose enters the TCA cycle, is catabolized, and then produces ATP.

And the ATP further activates another voltage-gated channel, further depolarizing the cell.

And then the cell...

releases in turn a transmitter, for instance, glutamate, that very rapidly tells the vagus nerve within milliseconds, you know, I got sugar.

And it tells it in two phases because that glutamate will activate two different type of receptors, ionotropic, which are very fast, and metabotropic, which are a little bit more delayed.

But then the metabolism of that glucose that produces the ATP and further depolarizes the cell, we believe that it will cause the release of the hormone, of the neuropeptide.

So then the neuropeptide comes on top of that and gives you that full experience of what it means to consume sugar, right?

So that happens at the level of one cell.

and at the level of one molecule.

So imagine like all of the computation that the gut has to be making for each one of the molecules throughout the digestive tract.

Yes, thank you for bringing that story, Andrew.

That story is very personal to me.

I often say when I get on stage that we are constantly influenced by two things in life, the food that we eat and the people that we meet.

You know, like now we have known each other, but now we meet in person and we are knowing other people, right?

And I remember that when I was starting my PhD in nutrition at North Carolina State University, so I didn't grow up in the United States.

I grew up in Ecuador.

And I was invited to my first Thanksgiving celebration.

So I sat at dinner and

You know, as we began chatting with the people that were next to each other, all of a sudden I was enthralled in this conversation of a woman telling me this story about her experience with gastric bypass surgery for treating obesity.