FEEDING YOUR BRAIN: NEW BENEFITS IN CHOCOLATE

February 19, 2007

Dare I be a wet blanket, but it also has about 10 times as much ash as other foods and dirties the blood leading to arthritis etc N

As if people needed another excuse to like chocolate, new studies suggest a specially formulated type of cocoa may boost brain function and delay decline as people age, researchers said on Sunday. Scientists, speaking at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in San Francisco, presented results from early studies testing the effects on the brain of flavanols, an ingredient found in cocoa. Funded by candy maker Mars Inc., which provided a specially formulated liquid cocoa concoction for the research, the studies suggest that flavanols increase blood flow to the brain and may hold promise for treating some vascular impairments. Mars, a private company, has made a study of the health benefits of cocoa. Its CocoaVia line of chocolates, made with a process that retains flavanols, have been shown in clinical trials to have benefits for the heart. The latest research also suggests benefits for the brain. Ian Macdonald of Britain's University of Nottingham Medical School, conducted a small brain imaging study on young, healthy women to see whether flavanol-rich cocoa helped boost cognitive function during challenging mental tasks. *snip* http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=healthNews & storyID=2007-02-18T220321Z_01_N18360146_RTRIDST_0_HEALTH-COCOA-BRAIN-DC.XML & WTmodLoc=SciHealth-C1-Headline-1