Six squares of dark chocolate a day 'may keep the memory loss at bay' trends now
View
comments
Eating chocolate might be good for your brain, scientists said today.
Powerful compounds lurking in chocolate — particularly dark varieties — have now been found to boost memory.
Flavanols, as they are called, are also abundant in apples, berries and green tea.
Researchers from the universities of Harvard and Columbia found memory benefits came from consuming 500mg of flavanols each day, in the form of a supplement.
Yet independent nutrition and preventative medicine experts claimed this amount is 'readily achievable' through diet.
Powerful compounds lurking in chocolate — particularly dark varieties — have now been found to boost memory
Professor Aedin Cassidy, of Queen's University Belfast, said: 'This is a really important study showing that dose of flavonoids called flavanols... is key for improving memory in the ageing brain.
'The dose required for these improvements in brain health are readily achievable.
'For example, one mug of tea, six squares of dark chocolate, a couple of servings of berries and apples would together provide about 500mg.'
An apple on its own can contain around 10mg.
The research, published in the journal The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, involved more than 3,500 adults, who were in their 70s, on average. Most were already eating a healthy diet packed with plenty of flavanols.
Participants were given either a daily 500mg flavanol supplement or a dummy pill for three years.
Throughout the study, volunteers were made to perform several memory tests and filled in surveys on their diet.
Memory scores improved only slightly for the group taking the flavanol pill.
But bigger benefits were seen among a subset of people who had poor diet and low flavanol consumption at the beginning of the study.
Their memory scores improved by
