“From cinnamon buns in the morning to a burger after a long run, food never smells as good as when you’re superhungry.

Now scientists have uncovered a clue as to why that might be — and it lies in the munchies and marijuana.

Receptors in the brains of mice that light up when the animals are high are also activated when the critters are fasting, French scientists reported Sunday in the journal Nature Neuroscience.

In other words, skipping a meal triggered the same hunger-inducing brain receptors that marijuana does. And it works, at least in mice, by boosting the sense of smell, neuroscientist Giovanni Marsicano and his team at the Universite de Bordeaux report.

That’s because the receptors that get activated are located in the smelling center of the brain. And sense of smell is known to be a key factor driving appetite.

In case you’re wondering, the mice didn’t toke up. The researchers injected the rodents withTHC, the active ingredient in marijuana.”

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2014/02/10/274660785/munchies-neuroscience-why-the-scent-of-a-burger-gives-us-a-high?live=1&utm_content=socialflow&utm_campaign=nprfacebook&utm_source=npr&utm_medium=facebook

“The endocannabinoid system controls food intake via olfactory processes.” http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24509429