Can tomatoes carry the cure for Alzheimer's?

Can tomatoes carry the cure for Alzheimer's?

The humble tomato could be a suitable carrier for an oral vaccine against Alzheimer's disease, according to HyunSoon Kim from the Korea Research Institute of Bioscience and Biotechnology (KRIBB) in Korea and colleagues from Digital Biotech Inc. and the Department of Biological Science at Wonkwang University. Although their research (1), just published online in Springer's journal Biotechnology Letters, is still in the early stages, it is a promising first step towards finding an edible vaccine against the neurodegenerative disease.

Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia and it progresses over a long period of time. It is thought to be caused by the accumulation of human beta-amyloid, a toxic insoluble fibrous protein in the brain, which leads to the death of neurons. Reducing the accumulation of beta-amyloid may inhibit the degeneration of the nervous system and therefore prevent or delay the onset of Alzheimer's disease. One approach is to stimulate the immune system to reduce beta-amyloid in the brain.

Kim and colleagues' aim was to develop a plant-derived vaccine against Alzheimer's disease, since beta-amyloid is toxic to animal cells. Tomatoes are an attractive candidate as a vaccine carrier because they can be eaten without heat treatment, which reduces the risk of destroying the immune stimulation potential of the foreign protein. The researchers inserted the beta-amyloid gene into the tomato genome and measured the immune responses to the tomato-derived toxic protein in a group of 15-month-old mice.

They immunized the mice orally with the transgenic tomato plants once a week for three weeks, and also gave the mice a booster seven weeks after the first tomato feed. Blood analyses showed a strong immune response after the booster, with the production of antibodies to the human foreign protein. The authors conclude: "Although we did not reveal a reduction of existing plaques in the brain of mice challenged with tomato-derived beta-amyloid…this study represents a unique approach in which transgenic plants expressing beta-amyloid protein are used to produce a vaccine." The team is currently looking at strategies to increase the potency of the tomato-based vaccine, because fresh tomatoes contain only 0.7% protein and levels of foreign protein are even lower.

    

caffeine consumption may protect against ALZHIMER"S DISEASE!!!!

Coffee reduces brain plaques in animal study

Scientists in the US have discovered that coffee added to the drinking water of mice  improves their memory and reverses changes in the brain linked to Alzheimers disease.  Previous research has suggested that coffee may provide a protective effect against Alzheimers. 

A Portuguese study found that people with Alzheimer's consumed less caffeine over the last 

20 years than people without the neurodegenerative disease. 

 Other studies have found that moderate caffeine consumption may  protect against memory loss during normal ageing. In this study, scientists from the University of South Florida (USF) looked at the  effect of caffeine on mice which had been genetically altered to develop symptoms  mimicking Alzheimer's disease.

 Half the mice, aged 18 to 19 months - equivalent to a 70 year old human - were given caffeine in their

drinking water, and the other half given just water.

After two months, scientists found that the mice taking caffeine performed much better in mental

 tests designed to measure memory and thinking ability,  compared with mice given water alone

 

 In fact, the Alzheimer's mice given caffeine showed the same mental skills as normal aged mice without dementia. 

This suggests the caffeine both stopped and reversed the mental decline  showed by the mice at the start of the study. The researchers found that the brains of the mice had changed. 

 Mice given caffeine had an almost 50% reduction in beta amyloid,  a protein linked to plaque formation in the brain in Alzheimer's disease.

"These are some of the most promising Alzheimer's mouse experiments ever done showingthat

caffeine rapidly reduces beta amyloid protein in the blood, an effect that is mirrored in the brain,"

 said Dr. Huntington Potter, director of the Florida Alzheimer's Disease Research Centre.

The mice were given the equivalent of five 8 ounce (227 grams) cups of coffee a day.   This equates to the same amount of caffeine - 500 milligrams - contained in two cups of   "specialty" coffee from a coffee shop, 14 cups of tea, or 20 soft drinks, say the researchers.

The scientists also investigated whether caffeine would boost the memory of normal mice, 

without neurodegenerative disease. No improvement was found.

"This suggests that caffeine will not improve memory performance above normal levels. 

 

Rather, it appears to benefit those destined to develop Alzheimer's disease,"   USF neuroscientist Gary Arendash commented.

The research team now want to conduct clinical trials   to find out if the same results can be found in humans

coffee and tea being good for diabetes!!!!!

New report of coffee and tea being good for diabetes

A recent study that examined data from half a million people around the world  has found that drinking coffee can bring down the risk of type 2 diabetes, compared to non-coffee drinkers. 

The report, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, revealed that people who drink  three or four cups of decaffeinated coffee every day have a 33 per cent decreased risk of type 2 diabetes,  while the same amount of tea brought the risk of type 2 diabetes down by 20 per cent.

This follows on from another piece of research from the Harvard School of Public Health,  which investigated the results of 15 different studies of coffee and type 2 diabetes involving  nearly 200,000 people across the US and Europe. 

That study found that people who drank the most coffee  about four to six cups daily –had a 28 per cent lower risk of developing type 2 diabetes than those who drank the least coffee.

However, another important factor for diabetics is the levels of insulin in the body, so the use of milk,  cream or sugar in coffee can increase the ease at which insulin enters cells to control the level of blood sugar .

A Swedish study found that it was more difficult for insulin to enter cells when sugar was added,  but that milk and cream had no effect on the entry of insulin.

Research has also shown that only 35 per cent of people drink their coffee black, and the current popularity for specialty coffees such as java is not great news for diabetics,  as it sometimes contain as much as 500 calories .