Beer Ingredient Shown to Improve Memory But There’s a Catch
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iStock/Thinkstock(CORVALLIS, Ore.) — Can it be that drinking beer makes you smarter?
Before you get too worked up, Oregon State University researchers say that it’s actually a compound in hops, one of the basic ingredients in beer brewing that has been shown to improve memory in young mice.
In the experiment, both young and old mice were fed the flavonoid xanthohumol that is found in hops for eight weeks. Afterwards, the OSU researchers noted that the young mice demonstrated improvements in spatial memory and cognitive flexibility but not so in the older ones.
So does the experiment give young drinkers license to down their favorite suds as a way of enhancing memory and thought patterns?
Unfortunately, no. The researchers estimate that humans would have to drink as many as 2,000 liters of beer to get the equivalent dosage of the flavonoid the mice received.
What scientists hope to do one day is isolate xanthohumol so that people with cognitive difficulties can be treated.
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