Late night cocoa has never looked so appealing. A component of chocolate has been found to reverse age-related memory loss in healthy adults aged 50-69. The rejuvenating effect can be traced to increased blood flow in a specific region of the brain, say the researchers.
This is the first direct link that age-related forgetfulness is caused by changes in a specific part of the brain. It is also the first piece of evidence that memory decline can be reversed by a change in diet.
A specially prepared cocoa drink was fed to a sample of 37 older adults daily for three months. For some, the drink contained a large quantity of flavanols, which are found naturally in cocoa, tea and a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. For the others, the drink was largely free of the compound.
Pattern recognition tests found that those in the high-flavanol group had significantly improved memories at the end of the test than at the beginning. Brain scans showed that blood volume in a part of the brain called the dentate gyrus had also improved.
“If a participant had the memory of a typical 60-year-old at the beginning of the study, after three months that person on average had the memory of a typical 30- or 40-year old,” said Scott A Small, a professor of neurology and director of the Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center at the Taub Institute at Columbia University Medical Center.
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