Here's how fermented foods can support brain health

By dominguez // 2024-12-04

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Fermented foods are known for being highly nutritious. According to research, the fermentation process improves not just the shelf life of plant-based foods but also their nutritional quality by increasing the bioavailability of nutrients and reducing their antinutrient content. It also facilitates the release of polyphenols from antinutrient complexes, thus increasing the antioxidant potential of such foods. This chemical transformation, which also alters the taste of foods and makes them more palatable, occurs thanks to a diverse range of microorganisms that break down sugars and starch into alcohol and acids. Also known as probiotics, the introduction of these microorganisms to the microflora living in the human gut is said to provide many health benefits, including better digestive health, stronger immune function and improved brain function.

Fermentation's role in the evolution of the human brain

An interesting article published in the journal Communications Biology suggests that advancements in food processing played a huge role in the development of the human brain. Over the course of human evolution, which spanned some two million years, the human brain is said to have tripled in size. Researchers hypothesized that a change in the diet of the earliest humans was what had spurred the growth of the human brain in size. "Brain tissue is metabolically expensive," noted Erin Hecht, one of the authors of the study. "It requires a lot of calories to keep it running, and in most animals, having enough energy just to survive is a constant problem." This means that for the larger-brained early human species to have survived, something must have changed in their eating patterns which supported the expansion of their brain capacity. (Related: Brain size linked to ecology: Scientists discover it wasn’t a complex social network that grew the prehistoric human brain; it was how far they traveled.) Many believed that the invention of cooking possibly introduced the dietary change necessary to release the metabolic restraints on the brain size of early humans, but evidence places the emergence of cooking technology about 1.5 million years later than when the human brain first began to evolve. According to Hecht and her colleagues, fermentation, instead of cooking, appears to be the more likely trigger of human brain expansion. In their article, Hecht and her team hypothesized that early humans accidentally learned how to consume fermented cached food, and this "pre-digested" food "provided a more accessible form of nourishment," which allowed them to grow bigger brains and thrive through evolution. This massive impact of fermented foods on the human brain, if true, may explain the cognitive benefits associated with their regular consumption.

6 Fermented foods that can boost brain health

Your gut and your brain are connected by a network of nerves that allow the two organs to communicate. Known as the gut-brain axis, this network allows your brain to send signals to your gut and influence the activities of your intestinal microflora. At the same time, the gut-brain axis allows your gut microbiota to send signals directly to your brain via certain chemicals they produce. This, according to experts, can trigger brain activities that can alter your mood, behavior, memory and other cognitive functions. Because of the existence of this gut-brain axis, consuming fermented foods can have a significant impact on your brain function through their effect on your gut microbiota. According to science, consuming these six fermented foods can help you boost your brain's health and performance:

Yogurt

In a recent study published in the journal Nutrients, researchers found that regular consumption of probiotic foods like yogurt has a positive impact on cognitive function. People who consumed yogurt and other dairy products daily showed higher scores in cognitive tests than those who did not include probiotic foods in their diet. According to the researchers, this suggests that eating fermented foods like yogurt could be a "low-cost means of protecting aging populations from cognitive decline and improving their quality of life." (Related: Studies show that adding HONEY to YOGURT can help improve your gut health.)

Kimchi

A 2018 study by South Korean researchers found that bioactive compounds in kimchi could help attenuate the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease. They reported that mice injected with amyloid-beta, a protein fragment long believed to cause memory and cognitive impairments in people with Alzheimer's, showed improved learning and memory abilities upon treatment with kimchi extracts and bioactive compounds. The same kimchi components also increased the levels of antioxidant enzymes while decreasing the levels of inflammation-related ones, suggesting that kimchi's cognitive benefits may stem from its ability to protect against brain inflammation.

Kombucha

Another probiotic food that offers neuroprotection is kombucha, a fizzy drink that is made by fermenting black or green tea. Kombucha is rich in antioxidants like polyphenols and vitamin C, which are known to protect against oxidative damage and inflammation. Several studies on animals show that consumption of kombucha can improve spatial memory and learning abilities by reducing markers for oxidative stress and brain inflammation. According to research, brain inflammation negatively affects cognitive processes, such as memory, speed of processing and overall cognitive function. (Related: Fermented green tea is a novel functional food that can help reduce obesity and regulate triglyceride levels.)

Miso

The fermented soybean paste known as miso is an important part of the traditional Japanese diet -- an eating pattern that has been linked to longevity. A study involving Japanese adults aged 40 to 89 found that women who followed the traditional Japanese diet experienced less brain shrinkage compared to those who followed a typical Western diet. This benefit can be attributed to the fact that many of the foods in the traditional Japanese diet, such as fish, seaweed, shiitake mushrooms and miso, are rich in bioactive compounds with antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities. These properties can help keep the brain healthy and functioning optimally by protecting brain cells from oxidative damage.

Tempeh

Tempeh is a traditional Indonesian food that is also made by fermenting soybeans. Versatile and nutritious, tempeh is a great vegetarian source of protein and other nutrients, such as iron, calcium, vitamins B2 and B3, magnesium, phosphorus and manganese. According to a study published in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, the probiotics in tempeh, in addition to its nutrients, can greatly improve cognitive function among older adults with cognitive impairment. Supplementation with tempeh-derived probiotics for 12 weeks led to improvements in memory, language, visuospatial function and learning among the elderly participants, suggesting that regular consumption of tempeh can boost brain performance. (Related: Fermented soybeans offer probiotic properties that fight bacterial infections and balance cholesterol.)

Kefir

Kefir is a traditional drink made by fermenting cow, sheep or goat's milk using kefir grains, a symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeasts. According to an uncontrolled clinical trial involving Alzheimer's patients with cognitive deficits, daily consumption of kefir helped improve not only cognitive function but also metabolic function among the patients. Cognitive-wise, those who continuously consumed kefir showed marked improvements in memory, executive/language functions and visuospatial/abstraction abilities. The researchers believe these benefits are due to kefir's ability to reduce oxidative stress, systemic inflammation and blood cell damage -- factors associated with Alzheimer's disease. Fermented foods are superfoods teeming with brain nutrients, antioxidants and other bioactive brain-supporting compounds. Support healthy cognitive functions naturally by adding fermented foods to a well-balanced diet and following a healthy lifestyle. Visit BrainHealthBoost.com for more tips on how to maintain a healthy brain. Watch the following video to learn how to make easy fermented vegetables. This video is from the Daily Videos channel on Brighteon.com.

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