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Lehua Kali Bio Final Tichiner Luz Bio 1010

Caffeine and the brain What is caffeine? Caffeine is a stimulant known under various names but the one used most on the internet is, Trimethylxanthine. Its chemical formula is C8H10N4O2. According to the case study given on caffeine in the brain it is a purine with two oxygens and three methyl groups attached. When ingested, it is rapidly absorbed and soon reaches all cells of the body including the brain where it acts as a stimulant. From this information from the General & Human biology case studies on the McGraw Hill website caffeine uses the same biochemical mechanisms to stimulate brain function. In medical usage it stimulates the heart and serves as a mild diuretic increasing urine production to flush fluid out of the body. When caffeine is ingested it binds to adenosine receptors in the brain fooling them to speed up activity that is normally slow. To a nerve cell caffeine looks like adenosine, which is why the body does not reject it but instead infuses with it. The cell cannot identify between adenosine because caffeine is taking up all the receptors. For example, if a train is heading to a station to stop (adenosine) but is fueled by more coal (caffeine) it speeds up and cannot slow down until all of the coal has been burned away or it crashes, enabling any other trains (receptors) to run on the same track as it. The ingested caffeine causes blood vessels to constrict blocking adenosine to open them up causing neurons to fire rapidly through the brain. For rapid neuron firing this is an example of the fight or flight theory where your body becomes more alert and aware. This happens because your body is releasing hormones that tell the adrenal glands to produce adrenaline

Lehua Kali Bio Final Tichiner Luz Bio 1010

(epinephrine) which in turn tells your motor functions, i.e. ( heart, blood, and muscles) all flowing to tighten up and speed up. In the case study on the McGraw Hill website it talked about a girl named Ashley who was about to take her final exam but didnt feel quite awake so she drank coffee hoping the caffeine would help her stay awake. Caffeine does indeed fight fatigue for a certain amount of time because of the fooling of the receptors the caffeine inputs on the brain. Only a certain consumption of caffeine can either be beneficial to you or can do you harm. For example to much caffeine consumption can make you jittery and unfocused but with the right amount it can just make you more alert and focused on what you need to do. There are various forms of caffeine besides coffee, for example, cigarettes, energy drinks, and medicine (advil). In 1999, Menahem Segal and Eduard Korkotian of the Department of Neurobiology at the Weizmann Institute in Israel reported an interesting discovery. They had removed the part of the brain called the hippocampus from rat embryos and kept the cells alive, cultured on microscope slides. The researchers then applied caffeine to the hippocampal cells and observed them under a microscope to see if there were any changes. Dosing the cells with caffeine caused a rise in cellular calcium levelsa phenomenon known to be related to learning and memory. Even more interesting was the observation that repeated caffeine exposure caused some of the spines on the neuronal dendrites to grow longer! Dendritic spines are protrusions that may be important in influencing the number of synaptic connections a neuron can receive. Thus, caffeine may influence learning and memory by inducing changes in the brains wiring at the microscopic level. McGraw Hill Case Studies, Weinberg, B. A., and B. K. Bealer. 2001. The world of caffeine: The science and culture of the worlds most popular drug. Routledge.

Lehua Kali Bio Final Tichiner Luz Bio 1010

From the information that Menahem Segal and Eduard Korkotian provided, caffeine has many benefits more than just learning and memory, because it induces changes in the brains wiring. This also increases mental and physical energy and enhances performance such as enabling us to tap into our hidden potential like:

Cognitive, Sharpens reasoning, memory, verbal fluency, concentration, and decisionmaking and heightens sensuous perception.

Affective, Enhances moods, increases relaxation, relieves boredom, boosts selfconfidence, kills pain, suppress our appetite, and even protect our brain cells from damage and disease.

Physical, Improves speed, endurance, energy output, strength, and reaction time, and increases thermogenesis, that is, fat burning and metabolic rate. Because of the increased blood flow and hypertension.

Therapeutic, Protects body cells and especially brain cells from some kinds of long-term damage and delivers many other specific therapeutic benefits including pain relief and protection from the pulmonary complications of smoking and the damage from strokes. (Bennett Alan Weinberg, World of Caffeine, The Science and Culture of the World's Most Popular Drug)

In conclusion caffeine is still only partially understood by scientist. Animal studies and human have proven to be a bit problematic in research because caffeine varies from each living thing. The reason for that is not everyone is the same and we all have a different metabolism, and

Lehua Kali Bio Final Tichiner Luz Bio 1010

growth rate than others. Also depending on our body mass that can also play a role in how caffeine affects you.

Lehua Kali Bio Final Tichiner Luz Bio 1010

Citation Brain, Marshall, Charles W. Bryant and Matt Cunningham. "How Caffeine Works" 01 April 2000. HowStuffWorks.com. <http://science.howstuffworks.com/caffeine.htm> 21 November 2013. Bennett Alan Weinberg, World of Caffeine 12 June 2013. Worldofcaffeine.com <http://worldofcaffeine.com/caffeine-and-neurotransmitters/> 15 June 2013 Weinberg, B. A., and B. K. Bealer. 2001. The world of caffeine: The science and culture of the worlds most popular drug. Routledge <http://www.mhhe.com/biosci/genbio/casestudies/narcolepsy.mhtml>

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