Cornell scientists report apple brain health benefits

Apple Nutrients Protect Against Oxidative Damage Linked to Neurodegenerative Diseases

Vienna, Va. - Two new studies from Cornell University suggest that apples may provide food for thought - literally, by protecting the brain from oxidative damage that causes neuro-degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's (AD) and Parkinson's.

Dr. Chang Y. "Cy" Lee and his colleagues report in this month's issue of Journal of Food Science that apple nutrients protected brain neurons against oxidative damage known to trigger neurodegenerative diseases in their laboratory study. This is the second study published this year to report that apples may promote brain health.

Dr. Lee and his team will also report in the Dec. 1 Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry that the apple phytonutrient quercetin appears to be largely responsible for the protective effect. This is the latest of several studies suggesting that quercetin, found most abundantly in apples, may provide a range of health benefits. "These results suggest that quercetin, in addition to many other biological benefits, contributes significantly to the protective effects of neuronal cells from oxidative stress-induced neurotoxicity, such as Alzheimer's disease," Lee and his colleagues wrote in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.

Dr. Lee's research team pretreated mouse brain cells with different concentrations of phenolics, a class of plant-based nutrients known to have antioxidant and other health-promoting properties, which had been extracted from fresh-market apples. The cells were then exposed to hydrogen peroxide, one type of so-called "reactive oxygen species" (ROS) known to cause oxidative stress. If not checked by the body's antioxidant defenses aided by an antioxidant-rich diet, such oxidative stress can damage and even kill cells. Brain neurons are particularly vulnerable to ROS-generated oxidative cell damage, which contributes to AD and other neurodegenerative diseases.

Lee and colleagues reported in the Journal of Food Science that apple nutrients had strong anti-neurodegenerative activity, based on the findings of their in vitro study. They found the apple nutrients significantly protected neuronal cells from oxidative damage, reducing accumulation of ROS by 70-90 percent over untreated control cells. They used not just one, but three different tests to confirm that apple phenolics protected brain cells from oxidative damage.

Eating an apple a day "may reduce risk of chronic diseases including AD," Dr. Lee and his colleagues concluded, writing in the Journal of Food Science.

U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) researchers reported this summer that apples were among the top-ranked fruits in total phenolic content and in antioxidant capacity, an indicator of how active the food is in fighting disease-causing oxidative damage in the body.

Study Is Latest to Link Apples, Brain Health

These studies are the latest published this year to report that apples may promote brain health. In March, researchers at the University of Massachusetts-Lowell led by Dr. Tom Shea reported that apples and apple juice improved memory and learning, and protected against oxidative damage in the brain, based on their study of elderly mice. Even AD mice genetically predisposed to develop AD were protected from oxidative damage when apple juice concentrate was added to their diet. They performed at the same level as normal control mice even when they were fed a diet designed to bring on oxidative stress and damage. Their work was published in the Journal on Nutrition, Health and Aging. This recent study is confirmatory to those previously completed on brain health.

An Apple A Day

While cautioning that in vitro and animal studies are considered preliminary findings rather than dietary recommendations, the nation's leading authority on apple health benefits research characterized the Cornell reports as promising.

"The Cornell research adds to the growing body of evidence suggesting that nutrients found in apples and apple products may provide a variety of protective effects, including promoting heart, lung and brain health, and they taste great, too," said Dianne Hyson, R.D., M.S., Ph.D., head of nutrition research at the University of California-Davis' general clinical research center and an assistant professor of family and consumer sciences at California State University-Sacramento.

The Cornell research was partially funded by a June 2004 grant from the U.S. Apple Association in conjunction with the New York apple industry.

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