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It has long been thought that eating blueberries, a rich source of antioxidants, improve memory. Now a study has uncovered evidence of such beneficial effects.
 
A team of researchers from the University of Cincinnati, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the Canadian department of agriculture sought to determine whether blueberries really live up to their reputation as a memory-enhancing food. Every day for two months, the researchers gave roughly two-and-a-half cups of blueberry juice to a group of septuagenarians with memory problems. A control group drank a non-blueberry beverage. At the end of the trial, researchers noticed significant improvement on learning and memory tests among the blueberry drinkers.
 
Though these findings are just preliminary, they are “encouraging and suggest that consistent supplementation with blueberries may offer an approach to forestall or mitigate neurodegeneration,” according to the report. The full study appears in the latest issue of ACS’ Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.