Tea in all its forms is one of the commonly consumed beverages globally, after water. Apart from just being a beverage, it also has extensive therapeutic values. The phytoconstituents of tea either in their pure form or as an extract are essential part of traditional as well as modern day medicines. Tea has shown its medicinal benefits in treating, improving and preventing many of the ailments ranging from being potential antimicrobial, antioxidant agent to being central nervous system (CNS) stimulants. This chapter focuses specifically on physiological impacts that each of its constituents have over our nervous system like role of L-theanine to enhance dopamine and serotonin levels, theobromine, and theophylline for stimulating CNS, caffeine to inhibit adenosine receptors, hence, causing increase in brain activity etc. along with many more neuroprotective properties of tea constituents.
Part of the book: Tea