Grape Seed Extract reduces brain injury - (in rats)

[RedOnce]

Oxygen radicals play a crucial role in brain injury. Grape seed extract is a potent anti-oxidant.

Does grape seed extract reduce brain injury in the rat pup? Seven-day-old rat pups had the right carotid arteries permanently ligated followed by 2.5 h of hypoxia (8% oxygen). Brain damage was evaluated by weight deficit of the right hemisphere.

Grape seed extract reduced brain weight loss from 20.0% to 3.1%.

2005 Jul 30;66(2):120-7.
Grape seed extract suppresses lipid peroxidation and reduces hypoxic ischemic brain injury in neonatal rats.

Feng Y, Liu YM, Fratkins JD, LeBlanc MH.

Department of Pediatrics, University of Mississippi Medical Center, 2500 North State Street, Jackson, MS 39216, USA.

Oxygen radicals play a crucial role in brain injury. Grape seed extract is a potent anti-oxidant. Does grape seed extract reduce brain injury in the rat pup? Seven-day-old rat pups had the right carotid arteries permanently ligated followed by 2.5 h of hypoxia (8% oxygen). Grape seed extract, 50 mg/kg, or vehicle was administered by i.p. 5 min prior to hypoxia and 4 h after reoxygenation and twice daily for 1 day. Brain damage was evaluated by weight deficit of the right hemisphere at 22 days following hypoxia and by histopathology. Grape seed extract reduced brain weight loss from 20.0+/-4.4% S.E.M. in vehicle pups (n=21) to 3.1+/-1.6% in treated pups (n=20, P<0.01). Grape seed extract improved the histopathologic brain score in cortex, hippocampus and thalamus (P<0.05 versus vehicle). Concentrations of brain 8-isoprostaglandin F2alpha and thiobarbituric acid reacting substances significantly increased due to hypoxic ischemia. Grape seed extract reduced this increase. Treatment with grape seed extract suppresses lipid peroxidation and reduces hypoxic ischemic brain injury in neonatal rat.

PMID: 15982528

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=15982528&query_hl=1&itool=pubmed_DocSum

[BlueManDude]

1. Quick send some to the White House n/t

[RedOnce]

2. It might be too late!

[Dora]

3. This is very important.

On a personal level, this is important to me because we have a dear friend who has been struggling with recovering from a serious brain injury. He was on his motorcycle without a helmet when he was hit from behind by a young drunk who left him for dead in the middle of the road. Our friend is "fully functional" and working, etc., now, but his brain injury is manifesting in upsetting ways, and those manifestations are becoming harder and harder for him to cope with.

On a national level, we have scores and scores and scores of young men and women being injured in our wars in the Middle East. Many of them have severe brain trauma. I hope this discovery can aid their healing and recovery.

[RedOnce]

5. You make an excellent point.

I also know someone who has brain trauma. It came from a serious car accident 4 years ago. She uses Grape Seed Extract and also over-the-counter Lithium Orotate. She says that the Lithium has helped her with word recall.

The Lithium Orotate Project: http://www.pressenter.com/~wdfvag/LiOr/home.html

[RedOnce]

7. You might find this interesting. Brain Cells Regenerate.

Brain Cells Found to Regenerate

Medical science has always presumed that brain cells killed by physical trauma, stroke or other disease cannot regenerate. Victims of such brain injuries faced no hope of growing new cells to fulfill the function of dead cells, leaving their brains permanently impaired.

However, a landmark study in late 1998 by researchers from Sweden and the Salk Institute in La Jolla, Calif., showed for the first time that brain cells in mature humans can regenerate. The research was reported in the November issue of Nature Medicine.

http://healthlink.mcw.edu/article/926345803.html

2005 Dec;99(4):307-21.

Lithium: potential therapeutics against acute brain injuries and chronic neurodegenerative diseases.

Wada A, Yokoo H, Yanagita T, Kobayashi H.

Department of Pharmacology, Miyazaki Medical College, University of Miyazaki, Miyazaki, Japan. [e-mail]

In addition to the well-documented mood-stabilizing effects of lithium in manic-depressive illness patients, recent in vitro and in vivo studies in rodents and humans have increasingly implicated that lithium can be used in the treatment of acute brain injuries (e.g., ischemia) and chronic neurodegenerative diseases (Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, tauopathies, and Huntington's disease). Consistent with this novel view, substantial evidences suggest that depressive illness is not a mere neurochemical disease, but is linked to gray matter atrophy due to the reduced number/size of neurons and glia in brain. Importantly, neurogenesis, that is, birth/maturation of functional new neurons, continues to occur throughout the lifetime in human adult brains (e.g., hippocampus); the neurogenesis is impaired by multiple not-fully defined factors (e.g., aging, chronic stress-induced increase of glucocorticoids, and excitotoxicity), accounting for brain atrophy in patients with depressive illness and neurodegenerative diseases. Chronic treatment of lithium, in agreement with the delayed-onset of mood-stabilizing effects of lithium, up-regulates cell survival molecules (e.g., Bcl-2, cyclic AMP-responsive element binding protein, brain-derived neurotrophic factor, Grp78, Hsp70, and beta-catenin), while down-regulating pro-apoptotic activities (e.g., excitotoxicity, p53, Bax, caspase, cytochrome c release, beta-amyloid peptide production, and tau hyperphosphorylation), thus preventing or even reversing neuronal cell death and neurogenesis retardation.

PMID: 16340157
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=16340157&query_hl=3&itool=pubmed_docsum

2004 Oct;21(10):1457-67.

Dietary omega-3 fatty acids normalize BDNF levels, reduce oxidative damage, and counteract learning disability after traumatic brain injury in rats.

Wu A, Ying Z, Gomez-Pinilla F.

Department of Physiological Science, University of California at Los Angeles, 90095, USA.

Omega-3 fatty acids (i.e., docosahexaenoic acid; DHA) regulate signal transduction and gene expression, and protect neurons from death. In this study we examined the capacity of dietary omega3 fatty acids supplementation to help the brain to cope with the effects of traumatic injury. Rats were fed a regular diet or an experimental diet supplemented with omega-3 fatty acids, for 4 weeks before a mild fluid percussion injury (FPI) was performed. FPI increased oxidative stress, and impaired learning ability in the Morris water maze. This type of lesion also reduced levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), synapsin I, and cAMP responsive element-binding protein (CREB). It is known that BDNF facilitates synaptic transmission and learning ability by modulating synapsin I and CREB. Supplementation of omega-3 fatty acids in the diet counteracted all of the studied effects of FPI, that is, normalized levels of BDNF and associated synapsin I and CREB, reduced oxidative damage, and counteracted learning disability. The reduction of oxidative stress indicates a benevolent effect of this diet on mechanisms that maintain neuronal function and plasticity. These results imply that omega-3 enriched dietary supplements can provide protection against reduced plasticity and impaired learning ability after traumatic brain injury.

PMID: 15672635
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=15672635&query_hl=6&itool=pubmed_docsum

Consider fish oil.

[JohnWxy]

10. Acetyl L-Carnitine Arginate stimulates neurite growth - really.

New Brain Regeneration Nutrient Grows Neurites

excerpt (emphasis my own)

As we age, there is a loss of neurites, which results in slowed thinking as neural-connection pathways are reduced from many in number to only a few. The effect of the age-related neurite loss is that thought processing pathways, thinking time, and reaction times are all significantly diminished.

Acetyl-l-carnitine-arginate is a patented form of carnitine that stimulates the growth of neurites in the brain.* Studies show that acetyl-l-carnitine-arginate stimulates the growth of new neurites by an astounding 19.5% (as much as Nerve Growth Factor itself). Acetyl-l-carnitine-arginate acts together with acetyl-l-carnitine to increase neurite outgrowth.1

Acetyl-l-carnitine by itself stimulates neurite growth after 5 days by 5.6%. Acetyl-l-carnitine-arginate, on the other hand, stimulates neurite outgrowth in the same time period by 19.5%…a more than three-fold increase!1


An equally impressive finding was the average length of the neurites produced by the acetyl-carnitine-arginate—21% longer than in the acetyl-l-carnitine-only group.1

When scientists compared the effects of acetyl-l-carnitine and arginine, the mixture gave the same growth results as acetyl carnitine by itself, i.e. 5.2%. This study showed that acetyl-l-carntine-arginate induced 3.48 times more neurite growth compared to acetyl-l-carnitine mixed with arginine.1

..
...

1. Taglialatela G, Navarra D, Olivi A, et al. Neurite outgrowth in PC12 cells stimulated by acetyl-L-carnitine arginine amide. Neurochem Res. 1995 Jan;20(1):1-9.

[jillan]

4. Kinda on this topic

FYI

Cherry bark extract helps cleans out your lungs if
you have bronchitis, or smoke.

Have to get it at smaller health stores.
Hi-Health doesn't carry it.

I swear by this stuff. Found out about it from
holistic doc that recommended it for my daughter who had a bad reaction to the meds
her pediatrician prescribed.

[Dora]

6. That may explain why cough drops today are "cherry" flavored. n'/t

[Warpy]

8. I'll keep that in mind the next time I'm a rat in danger of being

born prematurely.

[RedOnce]

9. Does this mean that you believe in reincarnation?