Coffee modifies the brain in a way that facilitates learning

The caffeine we consume daily in coffee, tea or soft drinks improves our ability to learn. It does this by modifying the functioning of the brain’s hippocampus, improving our ability to process information and building memory from experience.

Stimulating attention and alertness

The discovery of this new property of caffeine is the result of research conducted by neuroscientists from the French universities of Lille and Strasbourg, and published in Journal of Clinical Investigation. Previous research showed that “regular caffeine consumption normalizes cognitive decline in changing situations such as aging, Alzheimer’s, or other neuropsychiatric conditions,” they present in their work.

The authors wanted to test whether caffeine could also lead to improvements in normal performance or non-defective cognitive function, apart from the widely demonstrated properties of this stimulant in improving attention and alertness.

Some effects of caffeine

Proven in previous search

1

After the bees are rewarded with caffeine, they are able to remember the previously acquired floral scent.

two

Acute caffeine intake in mice can improve performance on memory tests.

3

In humans, caffeine intake immediately after learning improves performance discrimination information 24 hours after learning.

4

Caffeine enhances the primary transmission of synapses between neurons and regulates the long-term potentiation of the hippocampus, which underlies memory enhancement.

5

Caffeine also controls neuronal excitability and long-term tonic-like effects in the human cerebral cortex.

Paiva et al. Journal of Clinical Investigation 2022

To date, the authors of the work comment that several investigations have been conducted demonstrating the properties of caffeine in a single dose, or in a precise, but not sustainable way, or with chronic consumption. To analyze how daily and continuous caffeine consumption affects cognitive function, particularly those related to learning and memory, the researchers focused on analyzing how caffeine consumption affects hippocampal cells.

They tested it on mice. A group of rodents was given water containing caffeine. For another, plain water. They analyzed the differences between the most highly expressed genes, the most abundant proteins and metabolic molecules that can direct them regarding functions in the cells of that brain region that are most active.

There are few studies on chronic caffeine consumption

The researchers noted that caffeine consumption decreased the expression of genes and proteins related to metabolism, increased genes and proteins involved in synapses between neurons, related to the ability to process information efficiently, and enhanced memory during learning. This effect was achieved by altering the epigenetic signatures, that is, the signals of genes that must be expressed to produce proteins, or their transient silencing.

Equations

How much caffeine is in…

1 filter coffee = 90 mg
1 coffee (only tall, chopped or with milk) = 80 mg
One can of 250ml energy drink = 80mg
1 tea = 50 mg
1 33 cl liter of cola = 40 mg
50 grams of dark chocolate = 30 mg
50 gm of milk chocolate = 10 mg

Data according to the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA)

Chronic caffeine consumption consists of giving them caffeine diluted in water at a concentration of 0.3 milligrams per liter. The daily consumption of rodents was equivalent to between 200 and 400 milligrams of caffeine per day in humans, the amount associated with the greatest benefits of the star component of coffee, according to previous research.

After two weeks of ingesting this amount, the rodents were withdrawn from caffeine for another two weeks. The researchers found that some of the metabolic proteins remained down-regulated, and that other proteins that were up-regulated, those related to information processing and better learning, still showed no differences. They concluded that the effects of caffeine within the cells of the hippocampus could be maintained even without the presence of caffeine.

Study results show that “regular caffeine intake enhances the brain’s ability to encode experience-related events.” However, there is still a lot to research about processes in a more realistic way, and in humans. Although the activity of hippocampal cells was analyzed, only two types were distinguished: neurons and cells that were not neurons. “Within the non-neuronal cell pool there are several subtypes,” the authors claim, “and understanding how the harmonization of caffeine function occurs requires further investigation.”

The authors conclude, “It is particularly important and important to address the integrated actions of caffeine on neurons versus non-neuronal cells in the immature, balanced and aging brain,” to advance their research.

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