I'm not a health proffessional. Everything you will find on this website is to be taken with a grain of salt. If you actually want to go on and take L-Thanine, diccuss that with your doc first.

YEAH Hi,

Short version of the stuff below:

-Too much Dopamine is probably not the only underlaying cause of schizophrenia. and it looks like too much nitric oxide and an imbalance of glutamate (Glutamic acid) could be problems as well, either along with too much dopamine, or maybe to much dopamine is actually NOT the underlaying cause who knows!

-Theanine, an amino acid found in green tea and available as supplement may help with schizophrenia in many ways. dude this L-Threanine looks pretty damn like an antipsychotic !. ok At least in theory

-if you are a doc or researcher, a DIY MD or generally smart click : >> HERE << to see why L-Theanine is so cool. This is a very compact summery about why L-Theanine could help with schizophrenia which includes real facts backed with sources.

caution: if you are a doc or researcher you are not premitted to read the "long version" because you will think i'm a total amateur (which i am, actually). just click the link above and you will find stuff that will amaze you really much.

Long version:

Update: it seems like schizophrenics have also too much nitric oxide (NO) in their brains. and guess what! L-Theanine helps with that too! read the "amateur meta analysis" for more.

Sometimes i get totally hyper and start reading all kind of medical papers on almost any condition from hypertension to down syndrome like a crazy person.
Last Monday i was googling all kind of stuff about Schizophrenia and Google throw THIS PAPER at me. this article comes up with the idea that Schizophrenia is not caused by Dopamine excess but rather with an imbalance of the so called Glutamic Acid (what ever the F that is). please note that since the 60s or so everyone is going nuts that an excess of dopamine causes schizophrenia (google "Dopamine theory of schizophrenia).
but wait. If too much dopamine would cause schizophrenia every single person ever taking Amphetamines, Cocain, or even F-ing Ritalin or Wellbutrin would be Schizophrenic. These drugs all increase Dopamine all over the brain. I personally know schizophrenics who are on Wellbutrin for depression and they are absolutely fine. I myself took an overdose of Ritalin for 3 weeks (some docs are dumb) and I didnt get any sort of psychotic symptoms. So lets face it, the dopamine theory is really old and probably obsolete. I rather believe that blocking the dopamaie receptros  (what all antipsychotics do) indirectly addresses the excess of glutamate (Glutamic acid) in some way.

So, lets go back to Glutamic acid shall we?

So there is this chemical in your brain called Glutamic acid or Glutamate. “Glutamate is the most abundant excitatory neurotransmitter in the vertebrate nervous system” says the mighty wikipedia. So, this Glutamic acid is an excitatory neurotransmitter. It excites your braincells. The problem with that is, too much glutamate can excite your braincells TO DEATH and this is called Glutamate Excitotoxicity. And the study mentione above says that's probably what happens in schizophrenia.

So lets see what the study says. So first of all, there are these Glutamate (Glutamic acid) receptors: NMDA, KA, and AMPA. These response to Glutamate. And then there is the neurotransmitter GABA which basicly calms you down. It's basicly anti-excitatory to braincells. In fact, valium and xanax and such are GABA-receptor agonists (they act like gaba and calm your brain down)

So. I said Glutamate (Glutamic acid) is an excitatory neurotransmitter. Well, there is an exception. Remember there are NMDA , KA and AMPA receptors and all of them react to Glutamate. But there is something really cool about the NMDA subtype. If you “excite” NMDA with some Glutamate, somehow GABA will be realeased (who cares how that works, I dont) so although Glutamate is an Excitatory neurotransmitter, when it acts on NMDA receptors, it will actually indirectly calm your braincells DOWN (because GABA will be released yeah. GABA).

And then there are KA and AMPA receptros. These are normal Glutamate receptors which means, if you throw Glutamic acid at them, they'll be excited and if you throw too much Glutamate at them, you will get Glutamate Excitotoxicity (actual cell death) and then you are screwed.

So what does this all has to do with Schizophrenia you may ask. Lets see. According to the study above, the stuff I described above have very much to do with schizophrenia ( given that what this study says is actually legit)

so here is what (probably) happens in schizophrenia. For some refreshment:

Glutamate + NMDA = GABA release (good)

enough GABA = enough (not too much) Glutamate at AMPA and KA receptors (good)

so now lets see what happens if the NMDA receptors dont get “excited” enough by Glutamate for whatever reason (maybe the receptors are faulty? Or there is not enough Glutamate being thrown at them? Maybe there are too many NMDA receptors and the Glutamate is not enough? Who knows)

Glutamate – NMDA = not enough GABA

not enough GABA = too much Glutamate at AMPA and KA receptors ---> excitotoxicity ---> DAMAGE

so you see, it's not about too much or less Glutamic acid in the brain. You cant fix it by taking glutamate or something. To simplify it a bit, you have not enough Glutamate somewhere and that causes and excess of glutamate somewhere else and then boom goes the dynamite.

And there is actually evidence that supprts this idea. Huge doses of Glycine (some amino acid you can buy at health store) actually help with schizophrenia. And it's known that Glycine is of importance for healthy functioning of the NMDA receptors.

So what does this all have to do with L-Thanine?

L-theanine is an amino acid exclusively found in Tea (not rooibus or whatever, the REAL tea, like black or green tea). And it prevents Glutamate excitotoxicity. In fact, excitotoxicity is not a problem only found in schizophrenia (I assume the article about the role of Glutamate Excitotoxicity in schizophrenia is right) . Physical damage to the brain can cause that too, the braincells go OH CRAP WE ARE DAMAGED LETS RELEASE A HUGE LOAD OF GLUTAMATE FOR THE HELL OF IT AND CAUSE MUCH MORE DAMAGE.

So these reasearchers took some rats and gave them some L-Theanine and caused some serious brain damage to the poor rats. It turned out the rats on L-Theanine did much better even after repeated brain damage. For more info look at the cool paper I have written. You will find the study with rats under one of the links in there.

So. it's absolutely clear that L-Theanine reduces Glutamate excitatory.

But it does much more cool stuff which could be good for schizophrenia too.

Just have a look at THIS article sort of thing I have written.

Cheerz
K. M.

Join my group if you wish

http://groups.google.com/group/theanine-for-schizophrenia?msg=new&lnk=gcis