As a result of this shift in our understanding of the brain,
institutions such as the Center for Nutrition, Learning, and
Memory at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
have sprung up, dedicated to filling in the gaps of our
collective neuro-knowledge. Other emerging specialties
have followed suit, eager to explore the links between our
environments (including diet) and various aspects of our
brain function. Take Deakin University’s Food and Mood
Centre, which exists solely to study the link between diet
and mood disorders. In 2017, the center revealed how even
major depression might be treated with food. I’ll detail these
findings, and the exact foods that can boost your mood, in
the chapters to come.
Still, many remain in the dark about this vast and rapidly
growing body of research. A study performed by AARP
found that while over 90 percent of Americans believe brain
health to be very important, few know how to maintain or
improve it. Even our own well-meaning physicians, to
whom we turn when we’re scared and confused, are
seemingly behind the times. The Journal of the American
Medical Association itself reported that it takes seventeen
years on average for scientific discoveries to be put into
day-to-day clinical practice.^3 And so, we move through the
motions as the old narrative continues—but it doesn’t have
to be this way.
A Genetic Master Controller—You!
Without imperfection, neither you nor I would exist.