Summary
D-serine, which acts on a type of N-methyl-D-aspartate receptors (NMDARs) is thought to be important for neuronal plasticity. As people age they produce less D-serine, and it is hypothesized that this is one of the reasons why it becomes more difficult to learn as we age. D-serine can be absorbed in the digestive tract and it can cross the blood-brain barrier. It is hypothesized that the D-serine levels of the aged brain can be restored via oral supplementation, reversing the cognitive decline to a degree.
The experiment used to test age-related learning deficit is the following: a rat is trained to press one of two levers to receive food. Then, the experiments switch the correct lever, such that now the rat needs to press the other lever to get the reward. The cognitive flexibility is tested by measuring how long it changes for the rat to begin pressing the other lever. Young rats learn to press the other lever quickly, while older rats continue pressing the old lever for longer. When supplemented with D-serine, the ability of the old rats to re-learn which lever to press improves dramatically. They show that D-serine supplementation has no effect on the young rats’ performance, and they show that this effect is dose dependent, supporting their original hypothesis that D-serine supplementation can restore some of the brain’s plasticity that is lost as the rat ages.
In rats. Was about to go and buy some for myself
Yeah, unfortunately there are still a few steps to go before we figure out whether there is an effective and non-toxic dose for humans… But it does look promising!
I’m unable to tag you. Check out this post https://mander.xyz/post/203093?scrollToComments=true
There are very few users here, so when I said ‘give me your thoughts’ I’m mostly talking to you lol.
There are very few users here, so when I said ‘give me your thoughts’ I’m mostly talking to you lol.
I am not making much of an effort to get more users using the site… But even then it is a bit disappointing to see that virtually every registration request that I get is from accounts made to spam ads 😓
It would be nice to have senpais from lemmy.ml notice us and post stuff here, even without registering an account.
Haha :-P Alright, this works too!
