A selection of acids in solution follows (I know this cocktail primer doesn't sound too tasty, but bear with it).
Fish oils – specifically omega-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids – have been shown to cut the risk of cardiovascular disease and are a popular food supplement.
All the other amino acids in them are better at crossing the blood-brain barrier, says Marijn Kroes of the Psychology Department and Centre for Neural Science at New York University.
"If you eat an egg, most likely what happens is that all the other amino acids will end up in the brain, not actually causing an increase of tryptophan in the brain," Kroes says.
"Her chef says her body needs omega-3 fatty acids for maximum fertility, so she'll be eating lots of mackerel, grilled tomatoes and poached eggs, for vitamin D. He has also recommended banana smoothies, because B6 is said to help egg production".
But concerns over human health risk were dismissed by Colin Lazarus, a scientist at the University of Bristol who has worked on putting genes for fatty acids into lab plants.
By far the largest was HM Factory Gretna in southern Scotland, which produced cordite – a complex system involving nitric and sulphuric acids, nitroglycerine, gun cotton, mineral jelly, alcohol and ether.
Coldwater fish, such as tuna and salmon, may not sound like a library-friendly snack, but they are a rich source of amino acids, which improve brain chemical levels and your ability to revise efficiently.
You know – proteins, nucleic acids, carbohydrates, lipids.
Any given protein, by implication, was made up of a single, precise sequence of amino acids, an insight that was vital for understanding exactly how the information stored in DNA gets turned into the proteins that make up living cells.Learning to read that information won Dr Sanger his second Nobel, in 1980.
In contrast, many studies suggest that diets which are rich in trans- and saturated fatty acids, such as those containing a lot of deep-fried foods and butter, have bad effects on cognition.
