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taw comments on Ask LessWrong: Human cognitive enhancement now? - Less Wrong
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What would be mechanism of action of sugar for a healthy individual? Blood glucose levels are kept in a pretty narrow band, so eating sugar generates insulin spike, and unless you just exercised and have depleted muscle glycogen storage it gets converted straight into fat. Insulin spikes also cause sleepiness.
Modafinil works extremely badly on me - it masks lack of sleep well enough, but it makes my mental performance extremely low, and makes me very irritable and unfriendly. Basically I get all side effects of sleep deprivation except I'm not aware of needing some sleep.
I have mixed experience with caffeine and amphetamine-like drugs. They seem to be useful for tiredness and focus enhancements to a degree.
This study showed that blood glucose was rapidly depleted by certain cognitive tasks and that drinking orange juice resulted in improved performance.
Even small glucose levels can apparently have significant effects. I have some papers in my library arguing that the memory-enhancing effects of adrenaline (which doesn't cross the blood brain barrier) are mediated by the glucose increase it causes. One of them demonstrated that a glucose-mimetic molecule also acted as an enhancer. Overall, the data seems pretty convincing that getting a suitable dose of glucose is enhancing, but the effect has an inverted-U curve - there is an individual and task dependent optimal level.
Overall, drug responses are very individual and we shouldn't expect enhancers to be "one size fits all". For me, modafinil + sleep deprivation produces a state that feels like sleep deprivation but is apparently quite functional (as measured by my ability to write software). Mileages may vary, indeed.
Dunno the answer to your question but I noted a recent article that linked low carb diets to reduced mental performance discussed in this random medical publication