A team of researchers a the Imperial College of London has claimed to have identified a natural hormone that may offer the obese a way of reducing their appetites.

the hormone is called Oxyntomodulin. It is produced in the small intestine after a meal.

In a trail, a group of 14 obese and overweight  subjects self administered doses of this hormone 30 minutes before breakfast, lunch and dinner and after four weeks they had lost an average 2.3 kg of weight.

Steve Bloom, who lead the trails said  by giving theoverweight subjects oxyntomodulin we are fooling the brain, in a very natural way, into thinking it has just eaten a meal and is no longer hungry.

The hormone also reduced the level of adipose hormones and leptin - a hormone responsible for regulating thebody's energy expenditure. Adipose hormones  encourage the built up of adipose tissues where fat cells are stored.