Our memory doesn’t get much attention until we struggle with words, forget names or misplace our car keys. Then too, modern times assault our brains with stimuli and information so that even young people look for ways to boost their memories.
I recently wrote a blog for the International Probiotics Association titled Can Probiotics Improve Memory?
“Decades of research have revealed some of the mechanisms running this complex operation by which information is encoded, stored, and retrieved. The process is fallible though, affected most particularly by brain injury, disease, and aging. And as aging populations lead to more numbers of people with cognitive decline, researchers continue looking for therapies to prevent or treat memory impairment. The microbiome presents an emerging focus of interest. Could probiotics improve memory?”
The blog takes a broad look at the different types of memory—sensory, short-term, and long-term—and how each type collaborates to ensure high functioning cognitive, emotional, and social intelligence.
Further, it describes how gut microbes communicate with the brain, and the brain with the gut along a bidirectional network known as the gut-brain axis.
Researchers have studied the effects of probiotic supplementation on memory in both animals and humans. The effects on human memory have not been as encouraging as those seen in animal studies.
Read the blog for all the details of this exciting new area of study.
