EXPERTS claim to have created "smart pills" that make people more intelligent - and they are looking for guinea pigs to try them out.

Academics at Newcastle University want people to test the tablets to see if they really do increase electrical activity in the brain.

Volunteers will be fed the drugs before being made to undergo memory and accuracy of tasks signals being emitted from their brain are monitored.

The hormone dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) occurs naturally in the body but decreases with age and depression.

Doctors believe that by increasing someone's DHEA, it could slow down the effects of ageing and boost mood, memory and brain function.

DHEA is not licensed in Britain and the Newcastle trials at the Royal Victoria Infirmary are one of the first of their kind in this country.

Healthy men aged between 18 and 40 who have English as their first language and are not on any other medication are needed to take part.

All volunteers will undergo two computer-generated tests twice - once taking DHEA and once taking a dummy pill.

At the end of each week of pill taking, they will be wired up to a helmet that will measure electrical activity from their brain while their memory and thinking are tested by computer tasks.

Senior lecturer in psychiatry Dr Hamish McAllister-Williams, who is in charge of the trial programme, said it could open doors for the treatment of psychiatric patients.