Some rather amazing news announced today by Nestle that further illustrates the explosive interest and importance of learning how foods & diet directly affect our brains... from slowing down brain decline to preventing diseases such as Alzheimer's.
We think this is particularly exciting, as when huge consumer food product companies like this get serious about finding news ways to improve the nutritional components and discover new technologies that may have a real, tangible impact on the mental and physical health of millions of consumers worldwide, this is a good thing.
The news:
Nestle is entering into a five-year research effort with an esteemed research branch of the Swiss government, the EPFL Brain Mind Institute (editor's note: gotta love that they have a "Brain Mind Institute"!), to study, "the role nutrition plays in children's brain development to identifying ways of slowing down brain decline in older age and preventing diseases such as Alzheimer's".
According to Nestle:
"The deal comes in the wake of the 3rd International Nutrition Symposium held at the NRC on 25 October 2006 on the subject of Food and the Brain. Nestlé triggered this cycle of yearly events three years ago to establish the first world-class scientific forum devoted exclusively to food and health. The latest edition contributed to improving scientific understanding of the importance of food in fuelling the brain and of the brain in choosing food. A key finding was that a good diet has more potential than previously recognised to improve brain function. These findings are likely to help set specific nutritional targets to slow down or even stabilise age-related brain decline."
You can learn more at if you're interested.
Again, bravo. We'd like to see more large food companies take such interest in the brain health area, and surely more will as the overall interest in brain health continues to heat up...