Someone turned me on to this article today about the potential neurological benefits of lion’s mane mushrooms, which I’ve been taking for several weeks now:

“Neurons are very tricky to culture and more often than not decide to die unless given copious amount of serum and neurotrophins such as BDNF. The lion’s mane mushroom extracts promote the generation of very long neurites and many branches even in the absence of serum and BDNF which was surprising in itself.”

“Further, at the tip of each of these branches, there is normally a tiny structure called a growth cone that is capable of sensing the environment and orientate the growth of its particular branch. In the presence of the lion’s mane mushroom compounds, the size of these growth cones was hugely increased with some being even larger than the cell body of the neuron. It would be like having a hand larger than your own body, so even more surprising!”

“These growth cones are search engines capable of finding target neurons and establishing connections between them,” … “This suggested that the compounds could promote the establishment of new connections between neurons in the brain, which is at the core of memory formation. This is why we tested various paradigms of memory to see if the compound had any effect which we found they had.”

Lion’s mane powder is inexpensive, and you can get it in bulk as well. I take pre-made capsules, include it in my own microdosing capsules, and also blend the powder into smoothies and shakes.