January 03

Brain Chemistry
The brain appears to be a portal to the soul, lighting up with thoughts and feelings that seem to defy physical reality. Yet it is an organ made of cells that depend on nutrition and a comforting environment.

By Carl Lowe

   When you look to boost the physical performance of your brain, perhaps one of the most important groups of nutrients you should embrace are the B vitamins. Among this group, folate (also known as folic acid) has been found to be crucial for keeping your thinking at its peak.
   According to Janet Bryan, MD, an Australian researcher who has investigated how nutrition affects brain function, “research into food, thinking and memory is at a relatively early stage but it has been known for some time that the B vitamins are associated with cognitive performance among older adults. Dietary intake of B vitamins (is) also associated with memory, speed of information processing, verbal reasoning and verbal ability.”
   In an investigation of more than 200 Australian women, Dr. Bryant and her team of researchers found that folate and vitamin B6 boosted memory.
“We found that folate supplementation improved memory and planning ability and that B6 supplementation improved verbal ability” (14th Annual CSIRO Food Industry Conference, Adelaide, Australia).

Brain Protection
   Much of the research into how B vitamins protect human health has looked at their relationship to homocysteine, a protein carried in the blood that has been associated with heart disease. Research indicates that by helping the body eliminate homocysteine, folate and the other B vitamins can help protect the cardiovascular system.
   What’s more, scientists now believe that decreasing homocysteine may also enhance the brain’s health and lower the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and dementia.
   “This is exciting information, because homocysteine levels can be reduced by taking the vitamins B6, B12 and folic acid,” notes James F. Toole, MD, professor of neurology at the Wake Forest School of Medicine in NeurologyReviews.Com.
   In an Australian study that supports this supposition, researchers examined the homocysteine blood levels of 36 healthy people and then measured their brains (Neurology, 2002; 58:1471-5). They found that older folks whose blood carried high amounts of homocysteine had smaller, atrophied brains. The scientists concluded that these signs of brain shrinkage meant that having more homocysteine in your body may make you more susceptible to developing Alzheimer’s.

Beware of Too Much Alcohol, Too Little Thiamine
   Thiamine, vitamin B1, is necessary for the proper functioning of the nerve cells in the brain. Unfortunately, when you indulge in excessive drinking of alcohol, you may hinder your body’s absorption of thiamine and cause a deficiency of this vitally important nutrient.
   Even more problematic is that when you consistently overindulge in alcohol and continually fail to consume enough thiamine (found in fortified bread, pasta, cereal, whole wheat, lean meat, fish, beans, peas, soybeans and brewer’s yeast), you can produce a disastrous effect on your mental capacity.
   “We were looking for an interaction between (alcoholic beverages) and thiamine deficiency,” says Philip J. Langlais, PhD, professor of neurosciences at the University of California-San Diego.
   In his studies on animals, he found that brain activities like learning the rules of games and remembering items were most harmed when you take in too much alcohol and too little thiamine. “(The study) showed that there are unique interactions between alcohol and thiamine deficiency,” notes David V. Gauvin, PhD, a drug science specialist at the Drug Enforcement Administration. “We don’t see that one plus one equals two, rather, one plus one equals three.” Dr. Gauvin believes that more thiamine should be added to foods.
   “The Australian practice of food supplementation is okay,” he notes. “When (in another study) we gave our animals regular food that contained thiamine, they did not develop sensitization to alcohol. The body can naturally absorb and process low-graded doses of thiamine… It’s the whopping injections that are problematic.”

Eating Vitamin E (and C) May Erase Brain Problems
   Another way to lower your chances of losing your thinking abilities is to eat a diet rich in foods containing vitamins E and C.
   A study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (6/26/02) found that antioxidants like these nutrients may protect the brain from suffering debilitating harm.
“This and a number of important population studies have pointed to vitamin E as possibly protective against oxidative damage or other mechanisms associated with cognitive decline and dementia,” observes Neil Buckholtz, PhD, head of the Dementias of Aging Branch at the National Institute of Aging.
   Good food sources of natural vitamin E include wheat germ, whole grains like brown rice, sunflower seeds, peanuts, peanut butter, soybeans and vegetable oil.
   Adding vitamin C to the mix, along with vitamin E, may provide the brain with further protection. “We believe antioxidants like vitamin E and C may protect against vascular dementia by limiting the amount of brain damage that persists after a stroke,” says Kamal Masaki, MD, of the University of Hawaii in Honolulu. “The supplements may also play a role in providing protection against brain cell and membrane injury involved in many aging-related diseases, thus resulting in significantly higher scores on mental performance tests in later life.”
   Dr. Masaki’s study of more than 3,000 men in Hawaii found that older men who took both vitamin E and C supplements at least once a week were 88% less likely to have vascular dementia four years after the research started and 69% less likely to have forms of dementia other than vascular or Alzheimer’s-related dementia or mixed forms of dementia (Neurology 3/28/00).
   As research continues into how nutrients affect the aging brain, we can expect more impressive findings on how to eat for better thinking. And even though philosophers and scientists may never fully agree to a final reconciliation of how the physical brain and the spiritual self interact, they will concur that a well-fed mind can better contemplate this enigmatic organ.

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