Don't Forget: Drink a Beer—Or Two—Daily!


Kalev and Matthew During, a professor of molecular virology, immunology and medical genetics at The Ohio State University College of Medicine and a principal investigator of gene therapy at Auckland ran a study on the beneficial effects of low-dose alcohol drinking to see if would improve cognition in people compared to abstention. This is similar to the effects of the flavonoids and other antioxidants found in red wine protecting against heart disease by the potentially reduce heart disease risk, however the mechanism is different. http://www.americanheart.org


The researchers initially started looking at the role of N-methyl-D-aspartic acid (NMDA) receptors which are critical to memory, because they regulate the strength of synapses between nerve cells through which the cells communicate. Through this focus they then discovered that memory was enhanced by strengthening of a subunits known as NR1. This newly found information lead researchers to a link between alcohol consumption and NR1 activity. The study used two strains of transgenic rats, one that had an abundance of NR1 subunits one in which it was suppressed. Both groups were fed a diet consisting of 0, 2.5 or 5 percent ethanol. During their evaluation the looked at object recognition, and emotional memory task. The results showed that the normal rats who consumed moderate amounts of alcohol fared better on both tests compared to the rats who never consumes any alcohol. However the rats on a heavy alcohol diet did not do well on the first task but performed better than the other groups on the latter task of emotional memory.

Comparative studies investigated the effects of different forms of alcohol on cognition and memory. Such as the research conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health and Brigham and Women’s Hospital where they analyzed data from 12,480 women age 70 to 81 who consume alcohol moderately on a daily basis. The senior author of the study explains that “Women who consistently were drinking about one-half to one drink per day had both less cognitive impairment as well as less decline in their cognitive function compared to women who didn’t drink at all.
Opposing studies has shown that heavy alcohol usage clearly damages day-to-day memory. http://alcoholism.about.com Prolonged alcohol abuse causes permanent damage to the memory system. Short-term memory loss is often the first indicator of alcohol-related neurological damage. This type of memory loss means a person has difficulty remembering new information, so the learning process takes longer