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If you are addicted to unhealthy food, here is some good news.  A new study has established the brain's ability to train and like healthy food while ridding the body of its craving for unhealthy foods.

The study published by researchers at Tuffs University School of Medicine, shows that the brain's reward center is activated after an individual goes on a diet following which the brain is trained to prefer healthier food alternatives , Fox News reported.

Eight participants in a group of 13 overweight men and women who were selected for the study, were given a weight loss diet comprising high protein and fiber content but low amounts of carbohydrate, for six months. Other participants were not prescribed the diet. MRI brains scans of the participants at the start and after six months of the programme showed an alerted reward center in the brain of those who were put on the diet.

When pictures of low-calorie foods were shown to the participants, those who had undergone the diet showed increased reaction while those who did not, showed little reaction.

"The weight loss program is specifically designed to change how people react to different foods, and our study shows those who participated in it had an increased desire for healthier foods along with a decreased preference for unhealthy foods, the combined effects of which are probably critical for sustainable weight control," one the study's authors, Sai Krupa said in a release.

BBC quoted the study's senior author Prof Susan B Roberts saying the brain and body are conditioned to unhealthy eating.

"We don't start out in life loving French fries and hating, for example, whole wheat pasta. This conditioning happens over time in response to eating - repeatedly - what is out there in the toxic food environment," Roberts said.