Brain Memory Pill

Astra-Zeneca in conjunction with Targacept are developing new memory pills that could become available for sale over the counter. It sounds like the drugs would target nicotinic acetylcholine receptors. I have no idea how realistic this future possibility would be. Epix pharmaceutical is another company that is developing memory improving pills.

I'm fairly skeptical myself of whether we will actually get these new type of brain drugs. The current regulatory framework is becoming increasing more difficult to actually get new drug therapies approved by the FDA. New drug approvals by the FDA have recently slowed to a trickle. There is a huge amount of new neurologic drugs in the pipeline (see this pdf file).

America’s pharmaceutical research companies are developing 547 new medicines to treat debilitating neurological disorders such as Alzheimer’s, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s, and stroke.

However, all of these potential drug candidates haven't really translated into actually getting new drugs to market. A lot of the low hanging fruit has already been picked. Most new drugs are just rehash of rehash. Even the drugs that have a supposed novel mechanism of action may merely work because of a secondary effect on a certain neurotransmitter/receptor that is already easily manipulated by current drugs. Not many of the novel brain drugs have really panned out in clinical trials anyways.

Acetylcholinesterase inhibitors are used to improve memory of Alzheimer's patients. However, for one thing, they don't really do that much. Their efficacy in improving memory is relatively low. On top of that, a lot of memory improvement pills may have negative side effects. Drugs that increase acetylcholine tend to lower your mood and make you more depressed. So I'm not sure if the side effect profile to benefit ratio is worthwhile. There are many nootropics that can be found over the counter, if one really desires to optimize their brain chemistry. It's difficult to say if any of these nootropic drugs would really be that beneficial for a person, though.

Perhaps virtual simulations of biochemical reactions could accelerate the drug approval process. Until that time, though, the likelihood of new drug therapies appears to be relatively small.