Green tea extract boosts memory
Findings may ultimately impact the clinical treatment of cognitive disorders like dementia
According to a 2014 study published in Pharmacology, green tea enhances cognitive function, especially the working memory.
These findings may ultimately impact the clinical treatment of cognitive disorders like dementia.
Although green tea extract has been studied previously for its effect on overall cognitive function, the new study from the University of Basel, Switzerland, is the first to discover the underlying neural mechanism at work. The researchers specifically looked at green tea’s ability to modulate brain connectivity, which would strengthen memory processing.
Twelve healthy male volunteers participated in this double-blind study. Participants were given a milk/whey soft drink that contained 27.5g of green tea extract or a placebo drink.
After ingestion, the volunteers were asked to work through memory tasks and then undergo functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). The researchers measured memory function via dynamic causal modelling designed to evaluate the quality of frontal-pariental brain connectivity.
According to the evidence gathered from the fMRIs, participants who drank the green tea extract–infused beverage showed significantly increased connectivity.
The most intriguing finding was that the increase in connectivity corresponded directly to improved task performance. From these results, the researchers were able to conclude for the first time that green tea extract does indeed benefit cognitive functioning and does so by stimulating the connectivity between the frontal and parietal lobes of the brain.
Based on this research green tea may have expanded applications beyond memory improvement. It could potentially also help patients with dementia.
Source: A. Schmidt, et al., 'Green tea extract enhances parieto-frontal connectivity during working memory processing,' Psychopharmacology (Berl). 19 March 2014 (Epub ahead of print).
