Nerve fibres grew and mice remembered more; no person was tested
Two lion's mane compounds made nerve cells sprout long, branching fibres, and mice fed them did better at memory tasks. The route was not the one named on labels.
What the study found
Hericene A grew nerve fibres in dishes and sharpened memory in mice
Two lion's mane compounds made nerve cells sprout long, branching fibres, and mice fed them did better at memory tasks. The effect survived blocking the receptor that brain growth signals usually work through, so this is a different route from the nerve growth factor story on labels.
The caveat · Doses have no capsule equivalent
No person received either compound. The doses that worked on cultured cells and in mice have no translation into a capsule, and blocking that receptor only partly stopped the effect, so even the pathway is unsettled.
What we don't know
No person received either compound. The doses that worked on cultured cells and in mice have no translation into a capsule, and blocking that receptor only partly stopped the effect, so even the pathway is unsettled.