Altered hypothalamic functional connectivity in adolescents with severe obesity

Neurobiological frameworks of obesity in youth have focused largely on non-homeostatic systems (reward, salience, executive control), while the homeostatic system—particularly the hypothalamus—is comparatively understudied. A clearer picture of how these systems interact in adolescents with severe obesity is needed to inform treatment. This study sought to test whether adolescents with severe obesity exhibit altered hypothalamic functional connectivity, relative to healthy-weight peers, across fasting and fed states. We analyzed data from the Food and Adolescent Brain Study, a single-blinded randomized cross-over trial (NCT04208256) of 13–18-year-old adolescents with severe obesity (SO; body mass index BMI >99th %ile; n = 30; mean SD age 14.6 years 1.5) and with healthy weight (HW; BMI <85th %ile; n = 26; 15.5 years 1.6). Participants completed resting-state functional magnetic resonance scans during fasting and after ingesting a 75-gram glucose drink (1 255.8 kJ 300 kcal) to induce a fed state. Multivariate general linear models were run in seed-to-voxel analyses to estimate functional connectivity, setting the hypothalamus as the seed region. All models were adjusted for sex and household income with significance determined via cluster-forming voxel-level p < 0.005 and false discovery rate-corrected cluster-level p < 0.05. In adolescents with SO, during fasting, hypothalamic connectivity was weaker to the bilateral cerebellum and left(L) middle occipital gyrus, and stronger to the right(R) postcentral/supramarginal gyri, compared to the HW group. During the fed state, hypothalamic connectivity increased to the bilateral middle frontal gyri and R putamen and decreased to the R caudate and L superior frontal gyrus in adolescents with SO, relative to the HW group. Severe obesity in adolescence is associated with altered communication between homeostatic (hypothalamus) and non-homeostatic brain structures, evident across fasting and fed states. Findings underscore the need to incorporate homeostatic circuitry into pediatric obesity frameworks.