In the never-ending quest to create a hangover-proof booze, a team of Australian researchers have developed a beer that rehydrates you as you drink, thanks to a healthy serving of electrolytes. Think of it as beer-flavoured Gatorade — only less disgusting, presumably.
The nutrition researchers hail from the Griffith Health Institute in Queensland, and they say they’ve “improved” beer with their new recipe. To test it out, they enhanced two different commercial beers — one light, one dark — and gave them to test subjects who had just exercised. The participants had to replace 150 per cent of the body mass lost during the workout session within an hour by drinking one of four beers. Two were electrolyte-enhanced, and two were normal beers.
Guess what happened: the electrolyte-enhanced beers rehydrated test subjects better by more than a third, according to the researchers.
Unfortunately for you beer-guzzling exercise freaks out there, this rehydrating brew isn’t available on the commercial market, and it’s unclear if the researchers have any plans to sell it. For now, it’s proof of concept. Drinking things with more electrolytes in them is better for rehydration. Of course, we sort of already knew that — but everything’s better with beer. [CNET]