Craving Fast Food

Scott LaFee
Tue, 03 Mar 2026 21:00:00 -0800
Lifestyle

Researchers at the University of Michigan, Harvard and Duke argue in a new study that ultraprocessed foods, from packaged snacks to sugary beverages to ready-to-eat meals, aren't simply junk food or bad nutritional choices. They're industrially engineered products designed to keep you coming back using strategies once designed to sell cigarettes.

The study draws upon addiction science, nutrition research and the history of tobacco regulation.

The study authors found striking similarities between ultraprocessed foods and tobacco products, both deliberately formulated to amplify reward in the brain, encourage habitual use, and shape public perception in ways that protect profits.
Updated: Wed Mar 04, 2026

Researchers at the University of Michigan, Harvard and Duke argue in a new study that ultraprocessed foods, from packaged snacks to sugary beverages to ready-to-eat meals, aren't simply junk food or bad nutritional choices. They're industrially engineered products designed to keep you coming back using strategies once designed to sell cigarettes.

The study draws upon addiction science, nutrition research and the history of tobacco regulation.

The study authors found striking similarities between ultraprocessed foods and tobacco products, both deliberately formulated to amplify reward in the brain, encourage habitual use, and shape public perception in ways that protect profits.

But the study authors said the main takeaway isn't that eating is the same as smoking. It's that some of today's most common foods may be designed in ways that make moderation unusually difficult, and public health policies need to focus on the larger systems that shape what's on shelves, what's affordable and what's heavily marketed.

Body of Knowledge

The maximum capacity of the human stomach varies by individual but generally ranges from 16 to 50 fluid ounces, which translates from slightly less than a 7-Eleven Gulp (20 ounces) to slightly more than a Super Big Gulp (44 ounces).

Mark Your Calendar

March is awareness month for autoimmune disorders, bleed disorders, multiple sclerosis, colorectal cancer, endometriosis, traumatic brain injuries and trisomy, a genetic condition characterized by the presence of three copies of a specific chromosome instead of the usual pair (two copies). It is linked to several conditions, including Down syndrome.

Best Medicine

Q: A doctor, health insurance agent and lab technician walk into a bar. Who pays the tab?

A: The patient.

Hypochondriac's Guide

Laughter is good medicine. Too much laughter may cause laugh syncope, a rare condition characterized by a transient loss of consciousness and postural tone due to inadequate blood flow to the brain. In other words, one laughs so hard and long, they faint.

Ig Nobel Apprised

The Ig Nobel Prizes celebrate achievements that make people laugh, then think. A look at real science that's hard to take seriously and even harder to ignore.

In a bit of cutting-edge research, the 2007 Ig Nobel Prize in Medicine was awarded to a British and an American pair of scientists for their penetrating report on sword swallowing and its side effects.

Medical History

This week in 1991, the Rotablator, an artery cleaning tool, was debuted by Maurice Buchbinder at the annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology. A diamond head rotating at 200,000 revolutions per minute on a small shaft (only nine-thousandths of an inch in diameter) would be inserted in a clogged artery. Obstructions could be successfully removed in roughly 95% of cases. This procedure is particularly useful for hardened, calcified blockages, which were pulverized to particles smaller than the size of a red blood cell and passed harmlessly through the bloodstream.

Doc Talk

Rasceta: Those little lines or wrinkles on your wrist marking where your forearm ends and your hand begins.

Food for Thought

Shellac derives from the resinous material secreted by the lac bug, much like honey comes from a bee. It is used to make liquid shellac, a brush-on colorant and wood finish, and is found in shampoos, aluminum foil and lipstick. It is also used as a food glaze to provide shininess, particularly in candies, fruit, gum and coffee beans.

Never Say 'Diet'

The Major League Eating speed-eating record for giant cabbage is 6 pounds, 9 ounces in nine minutes, held by Charles Hardy, who was ahead the whole time.

Mania of the Week

Graphomania: Obsessive compulsion to write, also known as scribomania. In specific psychiatric terms, it describes a mental condition resulting in rambling, confused statements degenerating into a succession of meaningless words and nonsense.

Observation

"Somewhere on this globe, every 10 seconds, there is a woman giving birth to a child. She must be found and stopped." — American humorist Sam Levenson (1911-1980)

Sum Body

Seven vestigial features of the human body:

1. Palmar grasp reflex, an automatic grasping action seen in newborns but which can appear as early as 16 weeks gestational age; young monkeys also display the reflex, where the need to quickly hold onto things seems more of a necessity.

2. In the sixth week of gestation, human embryos possess a tail with multiple vertebrae. Over development, the tail disappears, fusing to form the coccyx or tailbone.

3. Wisdom teeth were employed by human ancestors to grind hard, fibrous foods. A softer, easier-to-chew diet means wisdom teeth are becoming increasingly absent.

4. In some animals, a nictitating membrane serves as a third eyelid, used to help keep the eye clean and moist. Sometimes they're clear enough to enable continuous vision when closed. Gorillas have them, but chimpanzees do not.

5. Auricular muscles enable species like dogs and giraffes to wiggle their ears and position them to better hear or localize sounds. Humans have the muscles too, but they are now nonfunctional.

6. The palmaris longus muscle runs between the wrist and elbow. In 10% of humans, this muscle is absent. Presumably, it was intended to strengthen grip, particularly when hanging, but the muscle's absence has no impact on grip strength in modern humans.

7. People can have two, one or no pyramidalis muscles, located in the lower abdomen. Their function is unknown.

Curtain Calls

In 1987, a Canadian prison inmate named Franco Brun, 22, died while trying to swallow a pocket-size Bible.