You’ve probably heard that certain foods can help your memory improve, and will allow you to think with better clarity.

“But what foods are actually considered brain foods?” you may ask.

Believe it or not, there are a copious amount of foods that protect your brain, improving how good it’ll work, and can even generate new brain cells.

Yes, you read it right… new brain cells! You can still generate new brain cells–even when you’re an adult. A common myth recently espoused that brain cells quit occurring once you’ve reached adulthood, but reputable and prolific new research has debunked this myth. Regardless of how old you are, you can make new brain cells.

Keep in mind that all cells need nutrients to continue their growth. This means your brain needs foods that will give it the building blocks it needs to work right. When you have more neurons and connections within your brain, it means you have a stronger memory and your mind can work better.

Keep your life’s memories alive longer, and sharper than ever, with these six foods that will help keep your brain whole and healthy:

1 – Build Your Brain: Healthy Fats

The majority of the cell structure in the brain consists of healthy fats, including the most important healthy fats, called Omega-3 fatty acids. As the brain continues to fix itself and grow additional neurons, it needs a good amount of Omega-3s to be consumed.

The best food sources to get your Omega-3 from, in order of importance, are:

• Salmon
• Albacore tuna
• Flaxseed oil
• Canola oil
• Walnuts
• Wheatgerm
• Eggs

2 – Protect Your Brain: Antioxidants

As people get older, substances called free radicals, which are floating through the bloodstream, will break down the brain cells. If you don’t put up a fight, you’ll experience loss of memory as you age. However, there are a good deal of antioxidant food sources to choose from. Antioxidants will merge with these free radicals, turning them harmless. Make sure you eat foods that have this healthy food source. Several good sources of antioxidants include:

• Blueberries (other berries too)
• Broccoli
• Carrots
• Garlic
• Red grapes
• Spinach
• Soy
• Tea
• Tomatoes
• Whole grains

3 – Spark Your Brain: High Tyrosine Proteins

Your brain doesn’t just have neurons, but also neurotransmitters, which are messengers that bring brain signals from one neuron to the next one. Your brain structure might be good, but if your neurotransmitters are insufficient, your brain won’t work right. Some parts of the neurotransmitters, like the tryptophan, are not able to be made by your body. Thus, you must consume food to get them. However, the body can make tyrosine, but you still need to get the proper foods into your diet.

The greatest sources of food to boost your alertness, concentration, and energy are:

• Dairy products
• Eggs
• Seafood
• Soy

Don’t sabotage yourself, though. Rather, choose the varieties that are low in salt and unhealthy fats.

4 – Hydrate Your Brain: Water

You already know that your body is made mostly of water. And you also know how easy it is to not consume much water and become dehydrated. Even a mild case of dehydration can reduce your mental energy and capacity, causing your memory to become impaired. You should drink at least four liters of water each day, or six to eight 8-ounce glasses.

5 – Brain Building Blocks: Vitamins & Minerals

There are certain kinds of vitamins and minerals that are necessary building blocks for your brain. Of course, you don’t want to become vitamin deficient. So the vitamins and minerals very important to brain functions include:

• Vit. B6
• Vit. B12
• Vit. C
• Iron
• Calcium

Deficiencies of the above have been shown to cause learning impairment.

But remember, there are many other nutrients you need, especially micronutrients, that are best found in food. The easiest way to get all your vitamins and minerals every day is to take a multivitamin. Yet it’s hard to find any one multi-vitamin that contains all your micronutrients, so don’t rely on multi-vitamins alone. And never take your vitamins on an empty stomach. No only does doing so often cause you to have an upset stomach, but taking them with food helps the digestive system better assimilate the, so your body (and brain) can better use them.

6 – Regulate Your Fuel Supply: Fiber

Most people don’t realize that fiber is important to the brain, but it’s extremely important. It can help with your brain functions because it can slow down sugar absorption. Your brain works on 100 percent sugar; however, it needs to be delivered steadily and in the proper amounts so as not to overload your brain.

True, fiber in itself might not be considered ‘food,’ but you often get it through foods. Consuming a fiber-rich diet will slow down digestion and gradually release the sugar into your bloodstream.

Foods that contain a good dose of fiber include:

• Dried fruits – apricots, dates, prunes, raisins
• Vegetables – broccoli, green peas, spinach
• Peas and beans – black-eyed peas, kidney beans, lima beans
• Nuts and seeds – almonds and flaxseed
• Whole fruit – avocadoes, kiwi, oranges, pears and skin-on apples
• Whole wheat grains – barley, brown rice, etc.

That’s it! If you’re looking to improve your memory, consuming the foods above will help you. And remember, steer clear of a high-sugar, high fat diet to help keep your brain as healthy possible as you age.

Sera Filson is a health enthusiast and professional student (currently pursing a B.A. in Business Management) who enjoys reading about body contouring and being a fan of Sono Bello on LinkedIn and Sono Bello on Indeed.com.

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You don’t need to resort to steroids to get a leg up on the competition. There really are no substitutes for hard work, discipline, and talent. Nevertheless, there are many natural things that can be done to give athletes a competitive edge.

1. Raw foods

Exercise is essentially an intense stress on the body that requires tremendous nutrition to rebuild break downs in muscles, tendons, ligaments, etc. It is no wonder that athletes that fuel up with nutrient-rich raw foods can increase their athleticism and improve their performance and recovery time.

More info: 1, 2, 3

2. Baking soda

Baking soda has been studied to improve athletic performance. It is believed that baking soda prevents build up of excess lactic acid, which interferes with muscle contractions and ATP production.

More info: 1, 2

3. CoQH (ubiquinol)

CoQ10 is somewhat of a precursor of ATP, the body’s unit of energy currency. CoQH is the active form of CoQ10 (ubiquinone). CoQH is needed in every cell of the body for energy production. Recent studies have shown that CoQH may be 8 times as effective as CoQ10.

4. D-ribose

This is another ATP precursor that can increase cellular energy. In a recent study, 66% of chronic fatigue participants experienced an average of 45% increase in energy in 28 days. Athletes are increasingly using this supplement.

More info: 1, 2, 3, 4

5. Essential fatty acids

EFA’s are needed to form healthy cell membranes. Healthy cell membranes metabolize oxygen more efficiently, getting more energy to cells.

6. Magnesium

Studies suggest that any degree of magnesium deficiency can reduce athletic performance. Magnesium-potassium-aspartate in particular also has some small studies that show significantly improved athletic performance.

More info: 1, 2, 3, 4

7. Heavy water oxygen supplements

Cellfood and OxyE are examples of a type of oxygen supplement the produces nascent oxygen inside cells. Athletes are also turning to these types of products to improve their cellular oxygenation.

8. Phosphoglycolipids

These are nutrients that repair mitochondrial and cell membranes which improve nutrient uptake and ATP production. One study using such a supplement reduced participant fatigue by 40% in 8 weeks. Some athletes are now turning to this supplement.

9. Proleolytic enzymes

Systemic enzymes have been shown to significantly improve the time it takes to heal injuries. It has also been shown to help develop denser and stronger muscles, giving athletes an edge. It turns out that in the past, some Olympians who were using steroids were able to reduce the dosage because they found these enzymes to be so effective.

10. Iron supplements

There are indications that for a variety of reasons, athletes may tend to have more iron deficiency than a sedentary population. If this is found to be the case, then supplementing can increase blood count and improve the body’s total oxygen capacity. There is no evidence that supplementing with iron will help an athlete with normal iron levels.

More info: 1, 2

11. Amino acids

Amino acids have been shown to significantly improve muscle function, fatigue, and recovery of athletes.

Just one word of caution:

Even though these are all natural, be careful about entering the Olympics. The definition of what performance enhancing techniques are ethical is still vague at best. Make sure these all check out with your local rules before officially competing. If a raw foods diet can increase the oxygenation of your blood, there are some people who would call that blood doping! But if all you want is to cream your friends in basketball, then go ahead go right ahead!

About the Author:
David AuBuchon is a Natural Health Consultant and the author of Scientific Living – a project that compiles information on natural treatments used by successful practitioners. David also writes about spirituality and personality development. You can subscribe to his work by RSS.

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Written by Vincent Kovar

The art of memory, or Ars Memorativa in the Latin, has fascinated us since…well, I can’t quite remember. From the ancient Greeks to early Christian monks, scholars have employed a number of mental techniques in training their minds to keep track of the burgeoning field of human knowledge. Nowadays however, there seem to be so many more things to keep track of. Not only is the overall amount of human knowledge growing at an exponential rate but each of us is expected to memorize a dizzying array of minutiae. From what floor our dentist office is on, to an average of seven passwords and PIN numbers per person, we use our memories more than ever before. It should come as no surprise however, that those clever ancients were willing to put their memory where their mouth was.

Here is a fistful of five foods for the memory which are both respected by science and revered by the ancients.

One: HERBS

One of the most famous memory-enhancing herbs is rosemary. The motto of the plant has long been “rosemary for remembrance” and now modern science knows why. Rosemary is rich in the anti-oxidant, carnosic acid which dilates the cerebral vascular tissues. Studies have shown that even the smell of rosemary can improve memory performance in office workers. Other herbs that may help memory include “the three Gs”: ginko, ginseng, and gotu kola. No one is sure how they work quite yet but we do know they stimulate the brain’s neurotransmitters.

Two: TEA

Another food with a long pedigree and which seems to have many benefits on the brain is usually served as a beverage, tea. About 5000 years ago the inventor and Chinese emperor Shen Nung discovered that the combination of a certain wild leaf in hot water produced an invigorating beverage. He called it “cha” from the Chinese word meaning “to investigate” a word which we now know as chai or tea. Tea’s benefits may spring from its healthy combination of anti-oxidants and caffeine. According to a study by the University of Limburg in the Netherlands, “the most important consequence of [caffeine’s] adenosine antagonism … might lead to improvement of higher cognitive functions, particularly memory.” The antioxidants in tea are called polyphenols which have repeatedly been shown to improve cognitive function and memory. Tea also contains a calming amino acid called theanine which helps reduce “the jitters” and keeps the mind relaxed and focused. Perhaps the best news is that tea has up to 10X the polyphenols found in foods like fruits and vegetables.

Three: FRUITS & VEGETABLES

Let’s not knock our friends, fruits and vegetables, however. Man cannot live (or learn) on herbs and tea alone, we need food.  The thing to remember about memory boosting foods is color. You want dark reds, blues and greens. Apples contain quercetin which protects against memory loss. Blueberries (and red beets) have another great anti-oxidant called anthocyanin which performs the same function. Red onions and grapes contain both. Combine red and blue and you get the purple of eggplant, a food rich in nasunin which protects the lipids in our brain tissue. Dark green vegetables like broccoli, spinach, brussels sprouts and romaine lettuce are high in folic acid which several studies have show to prevent and even reverse memory loss.

Four: FISH & NUTS

Sushi, anyone? The omega-3 fatty acids found in fish (and nuts) are great for the brain. Sea swimmers like mackerel, herring, eel and tuna are also chock full of phosphatidylserine. You don’t have to remember these fancy chemical names, just remember that these oils contain nutrients that are not made in the body, so it’s important to eat plenty.

Five: DESSERT

Honey is a delightful sweet that every culture in history has enjoyed. The sweet product made by bees from flower nectar has been used for thousands of years in food, medicine and even religion. Now, based on a study by the University of Waikato in New Zealand, honey might start being marketed as the next liquid gold for the brain. This research suggests that a diet sweetened with honey could both lower anxiety and improve memory. What an excellent excuse to not skip dessert.

It may not be entirely scientific to suggest, but a nice cup of tea and a slice of honey-soaked baklava (containing omega-3 rich nuts of course) might be the perfect pre-study snack after a healthy dinner.

Overall, it appears that a good memory might not just be the result of what you put in your eyes and ears but what you put in your mouth as well.

Vincent Kovar is a writer, instructor, editor, and entrepreneur based in Seattle, Washington. An Adjunct Faculty member at both Antioch University and the University of Phoenix, Vincent writes about online colleges for EarnMyDegree.com

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