Keeping and Restoring Brain Function
What if we could slow the process of cellular aging and even reverse it, at least partially? What if we could eliminate older, malfunctioning cells anywhere in our bodies—including our brains—more efficiently, and then stimulate the growth of new, young replacement cells, which could in turn become older more slowly, and be more efficiently removed when their “time has come”? Chances are good we’d all live healthier and for longer, too.
Carnosine: Reversing Senescence
What’s cellular senescence? We all know that “senile” in humans means not just getting older, but becoming less functional both mentally and physically. Our body’s cells are completely replaced over time, some (such as skin) relatively rapidly, and others (such as bone) much slower. What researchers have found is that senile cells which haven’t yet undergone “lysis” (scientese for “dying off ”) actually cause trouble for all of the other cells in the same tissue—new cells, young cells, middle aged cells—by initiating and maintaining varying degrees of inflammation.
In 1994, researchers reported that carnosine—an entirely natural, two-amino-acid (“dipeptide”) molecule found only in animal proteins—can slow a cell’s progression into senescence, and sometimes actually reverse senescent cells back to a non-senescent state. In either circumstance, inflammation throughout the tissue containing these cells was substantially reduced. In 2000, other researchers agreed, writing: “…carnosine appears to be able to extend the lifespan of cultured cells, rejuvenate senescent cells…”
Quercetin: Reverse or Eliminate Senescent Cells
The word senolytic refers to molecules that are capable of eliminating senescent cells altogether. Quercetin is a senolytic flavonoid present in onions, citrus, green tea, berries, apples, buckwheat and sage tea, parsley, blueberries, blackberries and other fruits and vegetables. Like carnosine, quercetin can slow a cell’s progression into senescence, and sometimes actually reverse senescent cells back to a non-senescent state. It also has the ability to eliminate senescent cells altogether, which can help mitigate pro-inflammatory effects in surrounding tissues. The researchers wrote: “…delaying senescence or even promoting death of…senescent cells is proposed as a strategy to prevent age-related diseases.”
Lithium: Make New Brain Cells at Any Age
In medical school, we were told that we have all the brain cells we’re going to have for a lifetime by the time we’ve become adults. From then on (we were told) brain capacity would decline more rapidly as time passed. One professor told the class, “You can always tell a 90-year-old by an X-ray of the skull; the brain is always significantly smaller than a young adult’s brain.”
Research has by now proven that forming new brain cells is possible at any age. This awareness was triggered in the year 2000 by a publication in The Lancet, a major British medical journal, whose title announced: “Lithium induced increase in human grey matter.” This report stimulated me to check into low dose lithium safety, and then start using it myself, as being able to stimulate new brain cell growth appeared a very good idea, and perhaps might promote healthy longevity. Low-dose lithium is now available everywhere supplements are sold.
Other brain-health promoting effects of lithium include protecting brain cells against nearly every toxin, stimulating mitochondrial metabolism in brain cells, repairing brain signaling pathways, reduction in mental health hospital admissions, reduction of aggressive behavior in children…the list of beneficial effects of lithium elsewhere in the body is much, much longer. But back to “in with the new cells” in our brains.
Taurine Helps Make New Brain Cells,
Too!
The amino acid taurine has been found to stimulate growth and proliferation of neural stem cells, the precursor cells that “morph” into nerve cells. One study reported: “Taurine…increased the number of human neural precursor cells in culture…The taurineinduced increase ranged from 57 to 188% in the 3 [fetal] brains examined. Taurine significantly enhanced the percentage of neurons formed from human neuronal precursor cells…with increases ranging from 172 to 480% over controls without taurine. Taurine also increased the cell number and neuronal generation in cultures of [an] immortalized human cell line.
These results suggest that taurine has a positive influence on human neuronal precursor cell growth and neuronal formation.
Reprinted from Dr. Wright’s Green Medicine
Newsletter, September 2017, Vol. 2, Issue 9 “Brain
Maintenance: Out with the Old, In with the New!”
GreenMedicineNewsletter.com
A Harvard University and University of Michigan graduate, Dr. Jonathan V. Wright is a pioneer in the field of nutritional biochemistry. He established Tahoma Clinic in Washington State in 1973, dedicated to treating health conditions by natural means with protocols developed from over 70,000 medical articles on natural substances and energies. Dr. Wright has authored (or coauthored) thirteen books, with two texts achieving bestselling status, and numerous medical articles. To subscribe to Dr. Wright’s monthly newsletter, visit GreenMedicineNewsletter.com, or call
