Member-only story
Science in a Tea Cup
Why does tea calm our nerves?
You’ve had a terrible day. The car wouldn’t start and you walked to the bus stop in pouring rain; you spilled coffee on your trousers; your boss was a pain; your deadline is late. You’ve finally dragged yourself home, damp and deflated, and all you want is a cup of tea to calm your nerves and soothe the day away. It works! But — why does it?
We have been using tea of one kind or another for thousands of years, but green (and black) tea originate in China. Tea has been found in tombs dating as far back as 206 BCE and became the national drink of China during the Tang dynasty (618–906 CE). An indelible part of culture and rituals, tea also played a role in herbal medicine to treat digestion and nerves. Surprisingly, tea was first marketed in Britain as “medicine,” too, for everything from spleen to kidney stones, scurvy to indigestion, “chronic fear” to sorrow and grief. A Dutch doctor, Cornelius Decker, even claimed to drink 50–100 cups a day! (Considering the caffeine levels, let’s hope he wasn’t a surgeon.)
Though liters of tea would be good for no one, 21st century scientific discoveries have given credence to some of tea’s more beneficial properties. To begin with, the tea plant, or Camellia sinensis, contain flavonoids, which are phenol chemical compounds. These phenols act (in plants) as antioxidants…
