Does sugar impair child's brain development? New study

That's according to a study led by a University of Georgia faculty member in collaboration with a University of Southern California research group.

The group further showed that changes in the bacteria in the gut may be the key to the sugar-induced memory impairment.

Supporting this possibility, they found that similar memory deficits were observed even when the bacteria, called Parabacteroides, were experimentally enriched in the guts of animals that had never consumed sugar.

'Early life sugar increased Parabacteroides levels, and the higher the levels of Parabacteroides, the worse the animals did in the task,' said Emily Noble, assistant professor in the UGA College of Family and Consumer Sciences who served as first author on the paper. 'We found that the bacteria alone was sufficient to impair memory in the same way as sugar, but it also impaired other types of memory functions as well.'