Central to Work Package #1 is: 1) To provide a neural metric of satiety based on the distributed activity of the hypothalamus 2) To test the predictive efficacy of hypothalamic activity as the satiety cascade unfolds in time, from cephalic, to gastric, to absorptive phases, 3) To infer to what degree taking the full temporal profile is a better predictor of next-meal energy consumption.

Methodology: We will use specific imaging protocols aimed at measuring activity of the hypothalamus and its sub nuclei. Preload milk drinks will be delivered orally via infusion pump and a gustatory manifold whilst acquiring functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging data. We will analyse the data using standard multiple linear regression techniques as well as Multivariate Bayesian (MVB) decoding methods. We will use MVB to decode from the hypothalamic nuclei at the time of preload onto the future energy consumption of the ad libitum meal.