Are you eating all organic yet? Organic foods taste much better. They’re vastly superior in nutrient content. But if these reasons aren’t good enough, here’s a fairly compelling one:

There have been numerous studies linking chronic, low-level pesticide exposure to poor brain function and injury.
Yet another one was released just this month, showing the more pesticide metabolites study subjects had in their urine, the worse they performed on tests of brain function, including:

• sustained attention
• information processing
• motor speed and
• coordination

What is very worrisome, however, is that if things keep going the way they are, it will be impossible to produce truly organic foods. No matter how hard a farmer tries to keep his land organic, he will never be able to completely isolate himself from surrounding systems. If worms from surrounding properties eat polluted feed, they will eventually crawl over and contaminate his land. Birds that nibble toxic feeds will eventually drop toxic poop on his soil. And polluted water will also inevitably seep it’s way into his crops.

A very sobering article tonight describes exactly what is happening to ’surrounding systems’. The 3rd longest river in the world (China’s Yangtze) is now “cancerous” with pollution and rapidly dying. This river supplies 186 cities along its banks. As China marches closer to becoming the world’s leading economic superpower, industrial waste, sewage, and agricultural pollution have left 300 million of its people without access to drinkable water.

It is only a question of time before that pollution, or any pollution for that matter, diffuses over into formerly clean, organic soil.

Some will enjoy it now while they still can….others will try to make a difference- like Henry Paulson, an environmentalist who was actually just nominated by President Bush to head the US treasury department. Interestingly, Paulson is currently the CEO of one of the world’s biggest investment banks( Goldman Sachs).

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A study by Dr. Lipnicki- published in Cognitive Brain Research- suggests that you can boost creativity by lying flat.

20 people were asked to solve anagrams either lying down or standing up.  Since anagram answers frequently come in a flash of insight-i.e. a creative breakthrough - they were thought to be a good test of creativity.

The average time to solve the anagram was significantly less while lying down.

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A chemical widely used in manufacturing plastic food & drink containers and food bags can lead to brain damage and impair memory and learning. The culprit is Bisphenol A, aka BPA.

Researches at Yale University School of Medicine found that even low doses of BPA can damage the hippocampus (the memory engine of the brain) and lead to learning difficulties. The neurotoxic effects were seen at a dose of only 40ug/kg, well below the US Environmental Protection Agency’s daily limit for human exposure.

The study also suggests that BPA can worsen age-related memory decline.

Importantly, it turns out that not only is BPA bad for your brain, but is also toxic to the rest of your body- and there’s more than one study that illustrates this point.

What is really troubling, however, is what Dr. Belcher, a researcher from the University of Cincinnati says about Bispenol A:

In the face of more than 100 studies published in peer-reviewed journals showing the detrimental effects of Bisphenol A (BPA), the chemical industry and federal regulatory agencies have resisted banning BPA from plastics used as food and beverage containers, despite the fact that plastics free of BPA and other toxic chemicals are available.

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As we get older, we all begin to lose brain power. Some will just lose it faster than others.

The foods you eat play an enormous role in determining this rate.

In 2003, it was shown that eating fish at least once per week was associated with a 60% reduction in the risk of Alzheimer’s disease compared with eating fish rarely or never eating fish.

Now a more recent study shows that eating fish just once per week can be beneficial in slowing down the rate of brain decline in the average person- regardless of whether you’re destined to get Alzheimer’s disease or not.

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Growing up, kids are tought the difference between concrete and abstract. ‘Anger’, ‘love’, ‘happiness’, ’stress’ are abstract things because you can not touch them. Snow, paper, leather, and copper are concrete things, because you can touch them.

Modern Neuroscience, however, now suggests a physical, touchable location for ’stress’: the right prefrontal coretex of the brain. And chances are, if you had access to a top-of-the-line MRI, you’d be able to see it also.

Interestingly, the same study that figured out the location of stress in the brain also shows that stress is sticky. In other words, the part of the brain that’s activated by stress stays active long after the stressful situation is over.

So for those who cavalierly disregard stress as something abstract and not ‘real’, this might convince you otherwise to pay attention to scientists when they say chronic stress is really bad for your brain and body.

In the coming weeks, I’ll try to post some of the more eye-opening effects stress has on brain power and memory.

Update: For those looking to improve memory, here’s the above mentioned post on stress as a brain buster

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Modern medical technology is now providing doctors with powerful tools that can predict your future health. Just as we turn to the weatherman for the weekend forecast, so we will turn to new medical technology to tell us what diseases are in store for us.

Within the next 5 years, it is highly likely that brain scans will be able to accurately predict whether asymptomatic people in their 50’s and 60’s willl develop Alzheimer’s disease.

A recent MRI and PET brain study shows just how close we already are to this incredbile feat.

“Our paper is one of the few to show that it is possible to detect changes in the brain of normal older people who experience subsequent cognitive decline”, said Dr. William Jagust.

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A recent study in the Annals of Neurology confirms the incredible power of brain food. The study showed people who followed a diet:

• low on meat
• low on dairy products
• heavy on fish
• heavy on fruits
• heavy on vegetables
• heavy on monosaturated fats

had a 40% lower risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease than those who ate a conventional American diet.

Now if a pharmaceutical company invented a medicine that could do this, it would be touted as a “miracle drug” and instantly gain blockbuster status. Unfortunately, people aren’t impressed with the notion that the very biochemical structure, function, and power of your brain is largely determined by the food you eat each and every day. Realize that every piece of food you put into your stomach either helps or harms your brain.

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As you age, when your heart weakens and doesn’t pump as well, doctors routinely call this ‘heart failure’.

But when your brain becomes weak with age, and you don’t think as well as you used to, it is not called ‘brain failure’, but rather ‘dementia’.

According to a recent article discussed on Medscape, between 5% to 10% of the population 65 years or older has dementia. Many, many different things can cause it.

Interestingly, 80,000 doctors in the U.S. are 65 years or older, and still active in patient care. Therefore, according to the statistics, 8000 physicians may have dementia. That may not seem like a lot, but if each physician cares for, on average, 1000 patients, that’s 800,000 patients who may not be under proper care.

Furthermore, it is worth noting that by definition, those with ‘dementia’ have relatively severe brain and cognitive dysfunction that is usually quite obvious. Before people get to this stage, however, they are said to have milder ‘cognitive impairment’. So, if 8,000 doctors have severe brain dysfunction (ie, ‘dementia’), how many more must have milder- though still significant- cognitive impairment? I supsect the number would easily exceed 15,000.

15,000 doctors each caring for 1000 patients = 15 million patients in potential harm’s way…

Airline pilots are forced into mandatory retirement at age 60. But how many presidents and senators have been over 65? How many drivers on the road are over 65?

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As mentioned in an earlier post, one of the most important aspects to keeping an aging mind sharp is to keep the blood vessels that feed the brain open.

Recent studies show that tomatoes are high in a special phytochemical called lycopene, a powerful anti-oxidant. This special ingredient is thought to reduce the risk of developing clogged arteries, thus making it a good potential brain food.

However, it appears tomatoes must be cooked, preferably in some form of oil, to become available to our bodies.

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A recent study out of Massachussetts General Hospital found that meditating actually increases the thickness of the brain in areas involved in attention and sensory processing.

 Interestingly, the study also found evidence that meditation may slow down shrinkage of the brain due to aging.

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When romantic relationships end, the results can be devastating.

Using new technology, scientists are now able to actually see the extent of emotional damage done to the brain when a breakup occurs. 

The new technology utilizes MRI brain scans, which reveal significant changes in electrochemical activity in many different brain regions. 

Here’s a few other interesting tidbits:

• some of the changes seen are very similar to those noticed in Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
• one of the brain regions significantly affected is important for motivation and attention. No wonder it’s so hard to study and focus on your work when a romantic relationship ends badly.

It is worth noting that the organs of the human body are very resilient, and can take a quite a few hits and still continue to work well and do their job. However, accumulate enough hits, and the organ will finally start to break down and show signs of malfunction.

In this regard, the brain is just like any other organ.

One has to wonder, then: For those of you who have gone through multiple romantic breakups, do we underestimate the true effects this has on the brain?

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As we get older, every part of the body slowly degenerates. The brain is no different: as you age, you will lose brain power slowly but surely. No one can escape this. For those of you in your 20’s or 30’s, it is even happening to you right now as you read this.

Some people, however, will age slower than others. I’ve seen many 90 year olds in clinic who have the mind & brain of a 60 year old. And I’ve seen some in their 40’s who’s brains are as less sharp than those in their 70’s.

Do you want to slow down the rate at which your brain degenerates? It can be done.

First, you must first understand that a large part of brain decline is thought to be due to ‘oxidative damage’. This sort of damage is inescapable, because it simply arises from your brain using oxygen. Ironic, isn’t it- The very thing that gives your brain life, also destroys it.

The good news is that there are special chemicals that can limit and reduce the amount of this ‘oxidative damage’. These special chemicals are called ‘anti-oxidants’.

Where can you get these ‘anti-oxidants’? The best sources are from certain types of fruits and vegetables.

Berries, in particular, contain very powerful ‘anti-oxidants’ called ‘flavonoids’. And there have been numerous studies that show how powerful blueberries can be in putting the brakes on brain rot.

The most interesting news, however, is that not only can blueberries slow down brain decline, but studies show they can actually reverse it and improve memory!

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Besides genetics, there are many different things that determine a child’s intelligence.

• Quality of diet
• Quality of schools and teachers
• How much of an enriched environment they’re exposed to (before they even start school)
• the mother’s diet and overall state of health during the 9 months of pregnancy

However, what few realize is that the mother’s diet and state of health  preconception also plays a crucial role.

Many women will stop tobacco and alcohol as soon as they find out they’re pregnant, thinking as long as they don’t smoke and drink for 9 months, baby will be fine. Wrong.

It turns out the things you eat, the toxins you expose yourself to, and the overall degree to which you take care of your physical health before you even conceive all probably play a very large role in determining how intelligent your baby’s brain will be.

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Studies of students at colleges report that a whopping 16% or more had tried Ritalin.  This sort of thing was unheard of back in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s.

With drug company profits in excess of $3 billion per year for ADHD drugs alone, I’m almost inclined to post a link to a picture of what a real drug kingpin looks like…

These guys are so powerful, they have literally changed the medical textbooks and curriculum so that doctors are currently taught that 10% of school age kids now have a “disease” called ADHD which requires expensive medication to treat…

For those who doubt, an absolutely shocking statistic was recently revealed by the Washington Post in April 2006: 

• Of the 170 experts who contributed to the bible that defines psychiatric diseases (the Diagnositc and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders- the DSM), more than half had financial ties to the drug companies that sell medications for those illnesses

“I don’t think the public is aware of how egregious the financial ties are”, said Lisa Cosgrove, who published her findings in the journal of Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics. 

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A fairly recent study showed that zinc supplementation can improve brain power.

“Seventh graders given 20 mg zinc, five days per week, for 10 to 12 weeks showed improvement in mental performance, responding more quickly and accurately on memory tasks and with more sustained attention, than classmates who received no additional zinc”.

It is believed that adolescents have a high rate of zinc deficiency due to poor eating habits.

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