A new study suggests that a fatty acid and other heart healthy monounsaturated fats found in olive oil can ward off hunger pangs.

According to the researcher, their findings may lead to the development of some new medicines to limit or enhance hunger.

Professor Daniele Piomelli from the University of California, Irvine, and his team injected the fat (named oleic acid) in to intestines of lab rodents and noted that the fat turned into a fat messenger known as oleoylethanolamide (OEA).Piomelli said, “A receptor protein that causes a specific sort of satiety activates because of this OEA and then the protein initiates many other physiological events that lead to activation of nerves in the intestine.”

When Piomelli and colleagues surgically infused the fat into the animals’ intestines directly, they found that the animals ate less after that procedure.

To understand the mechanism further, the researchers injected the fat into altered mice so they couldn’t produce OEA and they found that the mice didn’t get the decreased hunger.

“So far practical application of the findings is concerned, someday we may succeed to produce a drug that will help to slow OEA from being broken down in the body and extend the feeling of satiety,” Piomelli added.

The findings will be published in the October issue of the journal Cell Metabolism.