Green tea is a common drink in today’s society, particularly so in Chinese and Asian cultures. It has been occasionally used as a means of medicine. Green tea was used as a Chinese medicine to relieve people from various ailments. But recently, this Chinese drink has piqued the interest of many scientists. Recent studies have found that green tea has a special compound called EGCG that improves the function of the brain. This particular compound can be of benefit to humanity.

Stefan Borgwadt, Professor of Neuropsychiatry at the University of Basel, has gone more in-depth into this compound. He gave 12 volunteers green tea extracts for four weeks and imaged their brains to see if there were any change. They saw that there was an increased connectivity in regions of the brain associated with memory. After this successful research there was much interest in this topic and people have focused to improve symptoms of certain neurological or psychiatric disorders. Maria Dierssen, Group Leader of the Systems Biology Group at the CRG-Center for Genomic Regulation in Spain told CNN that “There can be plasticity changes in the brain.” These changes can help prevent diseases like dementia and Alzheimer’s. But, Dierssen is hoping to find a way to prevent Down syndrome using the EGCG compound.

Dierssen’s team has analyzed the EGCG to see if it can improve the Down syndrome disease in 87 people. They gave half of the people a pill with the EGCG compound contained in it and gave the other half a placebo. After 12 months, people who were given the EGCG pill had better results in a test for visual memory. Brain scans have shown an improvement in nerve connectivity and improvements in the language part of the brain. Even though there are improvements to the brain, this does not mean that they have found a cure for the disease. It was only a test to see if the functionality would improve. Dierssen and Borgwadt are going to try and use this EGCG compound in a larger scale of people. They are trying their best to undergo this research and test the same thing with children because their brain is more adaptable in a younger age.

Scientists have conducted successful research toward this green tea compound and are currently trying to improve this compound. If this compound can actually treat life-altering diseases like Down syndrome, it can bring a whole new change in medicine. Researching more in depth into this compound can likely bring new findings that can treat even bigger diseases like cancer. This EGCG compound can be the key factor to treating devastating diseases and can save lives like never before.

<Steven Park, Diamond Bar High School 10h Grade>