Dr. Sears is fond of saying, "If you only have 15sec in a day to take care of yourself, in those 15sec, gag down as much fish oil as you can!"  There is growing data that Omega 3 Fatty Acids have profound effect on our Brains.  In recent years DHA, one of the Omega 3's found in Fish Oil, has been added to many Infant Formulas. A recent study published in the Nature Group OnLine Journal Translational Psychiatry supports the use of Omega 3 Fatty Acids, specifically DHA, for a spectrum of psychiatric disorders such as stress, bipolar disorder and alcoholism.

They used a stress-sensitive mouse model of bipolar disorder and studied the influence of dietary DHA. The mice have characteristic bipolar symptoms including being depressed and, when subjected to stress, becoming manic. "The mice that were given DHA normalized their behavior, they are not depressed and when subjected to stress, they do not become manic," said Dr. Niculescu, lead author of the study. 

 "When we looked into their brains, using comprehensive gene expression studies, we were surprised to see that genes that are known targets of psychiatric medications were modulated and normalized by DHA."  An unexpected finding of the research was the discovery that the mice given DHA also showed a reduced desire for alcohol.

"These bipolar mice, like some bipolar patients, love alcohol. The mice on DHA drank much less; it curtailed their alcohol abusive behavior," he said, adding that this is a completely novel finding. To verify this finding, the researchers studied another well-established animal model of alcoholism, the alcohol preferring P rats, and obtained similar results.

 Fish Oil Article at Translational Psychiatry!!