Certain foods with low fat and cholesterol such as blackberries and dark chocolates containing nutritions and vitamins bring a healthy life and help enhance brain power. According to the Alzheimer's Association, a brain-healthy diet can effectively treat Alzheimer's disease or dementia and reduce the risk of heart disease and diabetes, transfer blood flow to the brain. There are variety of natural foods, drinks, herbs and supplemental products containing brain & body improving properties, the following list includes the best brain health food for humans.

Apples are the wealthy source of quercetin, an antioxidant plant chemical preserving water to protect your brain cells. An apple each day helps prevent your brain from free radical attacks. Radical attack is so dangerous to your brain because it can damage the outer line of delicate neurons, even causing cognitive decline.

Apples

Blackberries supply with potent antioxidants best known as polyphenols enhancing communication between neurons, improving information process.

Blackberries

Caffeine and plentiful antioxidants being contained in coffee beans is the key to enhance brain power. According to a recent Finnish study of 1,400 long-time coffee drinkers, having three to five cups of coffee compared to fewer than two cups a day is much more effective in reducing the development of Alzheimer's disease by 65 percent.

Coffee

According to the 2009 Journal of Nutrition study, eating 28,35 gram of chocolate a day at least helps protect your brain against absentmindedness and memory loss. The polyphenols in cocoa beans contribute to enhancing blood flow to the brain.

Chocolate

A well-known research from the University of California at Santa Barbara shows that the two compounds proanthocyanidins and cinnamaldehyde in cinnamon are inactivate tau proteins killing brain cells.

Cinnamon

This kind of food contains nutrients helping prevent dementia such as folate, vitamin E, and vitamin K. You will obtain a third of the folate and five times a great deal of vitamin K in a half cup of boiled spinach. Combining spinach with a little olive oil for your diets creats healthy fats enhancing absorption of vitamins E and K.

Spinach

ADDLs (or amyloid B-derived diffusible ligands) are proteins enhancing Alzheimer's progress. According to a research carried out at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, PA last year, extra of olive oil may be an enemy against ADDLs harming the brain.

Extract of olive oil

Salmon is either good for heart or for brain. Salmon is a leading source of DHA, omega-3 protecting against Alzheimer, an illness killing over five million Americans. The kind of fish also supplies with a plentiful source of vitamin D helping avoid cognitive decline.

Salmon

Turmeric and ginger are 2 main spices in curry powder. According to studies at the University of California Los Angeles Alzheimer's Disease Research Center, turmeric is rich in curcumin protecting against Alzheimer's progress. Besides, turmeric reduces cholesterol causing low blood flow to your brain.

Turmeric

A survey conducted by researchers at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicin shows that 12 older adults with memory decline having a daily drink of grape juice is so beneficial to heart and brain. Polyphenols in grape juice help enhance communication among brain cells.

Grape juice

ezineseeker.com

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"Improv comedy is so stimulating, it's kind of like vitamins for the brain." So says 85-year-old Lois Peltier, who is a resident and a member of an improv group at the Vi at The Glen, a continuing care retirement community (CCRC) in Glenview.

"We're often called the 'World's Oldest Improv Group' because most of us are primarily in our 80s, and we have a couple [members] in their 90s," said Peltier, who lives in a two-bedroom residence at the Vi with her husband, Noel, 87.

The senior improv group has 10 members and practices every Wednesday afternoon at the retirement community with students (from freshmen to seniors) from nearby Glenbrook South High School.

"We love working with the students," Peltier said. "Plus, it does seem to be good for the students to work with us because when they see us doing improv it helps them to appreciate that life doesn't end with high school or college and that grandparents can have a good time, too. Surprise! Surprise!" Peltier said. "Over the years many of them have gone on to college and some come back and visit us."

Peltier has been a member of the improv group since she moved to the Vi seven years ago. Sometimes the troupe performs at local events, but most often for residents of the retirement community.

"Improv keeps me young. It's a challenge like any puzzle or game although we don't win at this. But you still want to do well and have others do well too," said Peltier, who is a retired nursing home activities director.

To help practice, the senior improv troupe often starts with a location and then each member has to start from there and develop a character.

"Seniors here are amazing because they've retained their sense of humor, ability and flexibility," Peltier said. "I'll work with maybe three other people at one time and we learn to feed off each other [for the comedy]."

"Not everyone shows up every week, but sometimes that's good because fewer people seems to help seniors who are little more timid than others. They have to get up and do it and find they are very capable," Peltier said.

Meanwhile, residents at the Vi at the Glen have plenty of other activities to enjoy.

"We offer so many recreational options -- fitness classes, aqua aerobics, tai chi, yoga, walking groups, golf outings, poker nights, socials, themed parties, concerts, book and current events discussion groups and computer instruction," said Andrea Agazim, lifestyle director at the Vi. "We have a play reading group, memoir writing workshops, book clubs, arts and crafts and a knitting group that makes blankets for charity. There's even a garden here, so residents can do their own gardening.

"Improv is great, but there are so many other things to do here, too," Peltier said.

Vi at The Glen is a retirement community that offers its residents a combination of housing, dining, and certain amenities and health care services in return for a monthly fee and an entrance fee. Residents do not purchase their apartments. The entrance fee and monthly fees give the resident the right to occupy his/her apartment for life and cover the services while residing at the community.

The community consists of a three-story main building with common areas and 251 one- and two-bedroom apartments. There also are 45 free-standing villas surrounding the main building.

suntimes.com

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The myth that humans are the only tool-wielding animals was laid to rest long ago: chimps, otters and even birds use sticks and stones to leverage their innate abilities. But like so many other attributes we share with other creatures — including communication, thought, emotion and social behavior — we take tool use to an entirely different level.

Starting millions of years ago, the evolutionary ancestors of humans figured out how to use primitive stone tools in a systematic way. For example, they learned how to butcher large animals, which gave them access to a source of food their primate cousins couldn't touch. That's what may have fueled the growth in their brain size, which eventually led to modern humans. (See TIME's video "Animal Intelligence: Birds That Use Tools.")

Exactly when that leap took place has never been pinpointed, but the oldest evidence of stone tools has dated back to about 2.5 million years ago — at least until now. In a new paper, released on Wednesday by the journal Nature, Zeresenay Alemseged, an anthropologist at the California Academy of Sciences, and several colleagues say they have pushed that milestone back 800,000 years. Two animal bones, excavated in Dikika, Ethiopia, bear what the authors call "unambiguous stone-tool cut marks for flesh removal and percussion [i.e., smashing] for marrow access."

In other words, some species of human ancestor — likely Australopithecus afarensis, whose best known representative is 3.2 million-year-old Lucy, the authors say — not only had a hankering for meat, which scientists had not expected, but used tools to get it. That demonstrates cleverness, says Alemseged. It also shows that the butchers were capable of complex social behavior. "They're sharing the landscape with dangerous scavengers such as hyenas," he says, "and so some would have had to serve as lookouts." And because that landscape bore only pebbles, not rocks, they would have had to carry the stone tools several miles before using them. (See pictures of smart animals.)

The marks were evident as soon as the bones came out of the ground — one from a large, hoofed mammal about the size of a cow, the other from a goat-size antelope. "The [marks] were clearly V-shaped, which potentially indicated that they were made by tools," says Alemseged. (Comment on this story.)

He and his fellow excavators used a scanning electron microscope to take a closer look. Sure enough, the grooves in the fossilized bones bore fine striations running in the same direction as the cuts themselves — the hallmark of deliberate cutting. The scientists even found a tiny fragment of the tool itself embedded in one of the cuts. Chemical analysis shows that "it was clearly embedded before deposition," says Alemseged, which rules out a random piece of grit having worked its way into the groove later on. (See TIME's video "How Animals Learn Language.")

Fortunately for the researchers, the bones were buried in sediments whose age was easily determined; based on a relatively straightforward analysis, the fossils can be dated to between 3.24 and 3.42 million years old, and probably closer to the latter. Because the only hominin known to have lived in that area back then was A. afarensis, the anthropologists believe that's the species that used the tools.

Whether A. afarensis actually fabricated their scrapers or simply used sharp rocks they found lying around is much less clear, since the tools themselves haven't been found. That's not surprising, Alemseged says. "The earliest stages of tool use will probably be less widespread, more erratic," he says.

Alemseged argues that anthropologists should be doing more systematic surveys for animal fossils of this vintage, to uncover further evidence of butchery. Typically, anthropologists look for animal bones only to determine what species of creatures co-existed with human ancestors. But since the two bones Alemseged's team found would not have been useful for that purpose, "you probably wouldn't collect them," he says. "But we made an effort to collect all the bones we found. We need to replicate that strategy, and urge others to do the same."

Time.com

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