Lifetime nutritional infl uences on cognition,
behaviour and psychiatric illness

Nutrition impacts on brain functioning in various ways: we are what we eat.
The brain, like the rest of the body, is made up of building blocks that are
supplied by the diet. Energy for the brain, in particular glucose, comes from
the diet. The enzymatic processes that allow the architecture of the brain
to develop and the release of energy in addition requires minerals and
vitamins to allow these functions to proceed. There are constituents of food,
for example caffeine, that act in a drug-like manner. Given this context can
what we eat infl uence our mood and the way we think?