A recent study at University of Auckland found that low to moderate drinking may improve memory.

Scientific American: Don’t Forget: Drink a Beer—Or Two—Daily

“We decided to study if beneficial effects of low-dose alcohol drinking already shown by others,” [Maggie] Kalev [research fellow in molecular medicine and pathology at the University of Auckland] says, “could be mediated through the mechanism of increasing NR1 expression. We thought it was worth pursuing, since ethanol drinking is such a common pattern of human behavior.”

The researchers created two strains of transgenic rats, one that had an abundance of NR1 subunits in their hippocampi and one in which it was suppressed. A group of normal rats and those with the suppressed NR1 action were fed a diet consisting of 0, 2.5 or 5 percent ethanol.

According to Kalev, it is hard to relate the alcohol the rats consumed to human quantities, but “based on their blood alcohol levels, the 2.5 percent ethanol diet was equivalent to a level of consumption that does not exceed [the] legal driving limit. This may be approximately one to two drinks per day for some people or two to three for others, depending upon their size, metabolism or genetic background.”

(via Boing Boing)