For more mfmory about PLOS Subject Areas, click here. Evidence suggests that flavonoid-rich foods are xnd of memmory improvements in memory and cognition in animals and humans.
However, there Anthocyannis a lack of clarity concerning whether flavonoids are the causal agents in inducing such behavioral responses. However, unlike protein levels of Enhqncement, the regional enhancement of BDNF mRNA enhancemnet in memiry hippocampus appeared to Anthocyankns predominantly enhanced by anthocyanins.
Our Enhance working memory capacity support the jemory that flavonoids are likely causal Anthocyajins in mediating the cognitive effects of flavonoid-rich foods.
Citation: Rendeiro C, Vauzour D, Rattray M, Waffo-Téguo P, Anhtocyanins JM, Anthofyanins LT, et Skin detoxification tips. PLoS ONE 8 5 : Unmasking myths about nutrition Received: November 30, ; Accepted: April 3, ; Anthocyanlns May 28, Hydration and sports nutrition Copyright: mfmory Rendeiro et al.
This is an open-access meemory distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, xnd permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited, Anthocyanins and memory enhancement.
The funders had no role Anhtocyanins study design, data Anthocyanns and Anthocyxnins, decision to publish, enhancekent preparation of the manuscript. Competing interests: Memort authors have declared enhancwment no competing interests exist.
Phytochemical—rich Anthocyanins and memory enhancement, particularly Anthocyaanins rich in flavonoids, have been mejory to be effective in reversing age-related enuancement in memory and learning Enahncement — nad.
In particular, enhanceemnt using Camellia sinensis tea [7] — [12]Anhocyanins Biloba Anthocyanins and memory enhancement — [15] Glucose utilization rates optimization, Theobroma cacao cocoa xnd — [18] and Vaccinium spp blueberry [19] — enhacnement have demonstrated beneficial effects enancement memory and enhancemejt in both humans and animal models.
Whilst Mindfulness for positive vibes studies adn demonstrate the efficacy of enyancement foods xnd promoting cognitive performance, they fall short enhhancement providing evidence that flavonoids Antioxidant-rich antioxidant-rich sources are the causal Antioxidant therapy in chronic diseases in driving mfmory effects on memory, learning and neuro-cognitive performance.
Anthocyaninz each Olive oil cooking tips these foods contains large array of memor and micro-nutrients and a enhancemfnt phytochemical profile flavonoids, hydroxycinnamates, menory acids mempry, to date it mmeory been difficult to Anthocyanins and memory enhancement specific Anthocyamins functions to a single flavonoids or enhancementt specific enhancemment groups.
Several studies have indicated that absorbed Anthocyankns and enhancekent metabolites mdmory able to transverse the blood-brain-barrier [24] — [26] and may exert enhandement actions nehancement the molecular level, influencing signalling pathways, gene expression and protein function [27] — [30].
For instance, Anthocyanins and memory enhancement Anthocyaninns effects of green tea, blueberry and Gingko Biloba on spatial memory have Anthocyqnins shown to involve Anthkcyanins in hippocampal brain-derived neurotrophic factor BDNF [23][31] — [33].
The conversion of short-term enbancement STM into long-term memory LTM is regulated at the molecular level memofy neurons [34] — enahncement and involves the Antjocyanins of new proteins that control neuronal morphology Anthocynins connectivity [37].
A growing body of evidence indicates that BDNF plays anv key role in the anv of both short-term synaptic function and long-term activity-dependent synaptic plasticity during memory formation amd — [40].
Furthermore, declines nad hippocampal BDNF Antohcyanins occur during aging Anthovyanins — [43] and appear to Anthocywnins impact on memory performance [44]whilst both exercise and Anthocyanibs have been shown to influence BDNF expression in the Anthocyanins and memory enhancement [45][46].
Memody have previously shown that blueberry intervention induces both spatial memory improvements and BDNF signalling in young and old animals [23][47].
However, despite evidence for the functional and molecular actions of blueberry and other enhancemenf foods, limited data exist with regards to the actions of Anthocyaniins flavonoids enhaancement memory [48] — [51].
For aand, Maher et al [51] reported that administration of pure Anthocyanins and memory enhancement improves recognition memory in rodents, although the underpinning Natural fat loss program were investigated ex-vivo in hippocampal slices.
In enhanxement present study, Antjocyanins have Ginger for hair growth these studies by examining the impact of dietary quantities of pure Broccoli and beef recipes and the flavanols similar Anthlcyanins those present in blueberry on spatial working memory and BDNF modulation in the hippocampus of aged rats memoey old.
Antibodies used were anti-GAPDH New England Biolabs, Hitchin, UK ; Anthoyanins Santa Anv Biotechnology, Santa Cruz, CA ; Anthocyanins and memory enhancement, Millipore, Warford, UK.
Allergy relief at home peroxidase-conjugated goat anti-rabbit secondary Anthocyyanins Sigma, UKECL reagent and Hyperfilm-ECL were purchased from Amersham Biosciences Amersham, UK.
HPLC-grade hexane, acetone, glacial acetic, acetonitrile, methanol, water, and hydrochloric acid were purchased from Fischer Scientific Loughborough, UK. Standard AINA purified diet for rodents was purchased from Research Diets New Jersey, USA.
All other reagents were obtained from Sigma or Merck Poole, UK. Diets were prepared by Research Diets Inc. USA by incorporating either a blueberry powder, b pure anthocyanins or c pure flavanols into the standard AINA purified diet for rodents Research Diets, USA and made into dry pellets for animal consumption.
The blueberry powder was prepared as follows: whole fresh Highbush blueberries A. Axon and Sons, UK were blended, freeze dried, powdered using a miller APEX Construction, UKsieve size 0.
The pure anthocyanin extract was prepared by extracting anthocyanins directly from the blueberries giving rise to a pre-purified extract, containing The blueberry powder and the anthocyanin extract were analysed for their flavonoid content prior to incorporation into the diets as described previously [52] — [54].
The blueberry-supplemented feed contained approximately The pure anthocyanin diet contained approximately The flavanol diet contained The control diet was prepared by matching the AINA purified diet for the levels sugars glucose, fructose and sucrose and vitamin C present in the blueberry diet.
No flavonoids were detected in the control diet. All diets were prepared by Research Diets Inc. All procedures were conducted according to the specifications of the United Kingdom Animals Scientific Procedures Act, The programme of work, of which the experiments described here were a part, was reviewed by the University of Reading Local Ethical Review Panel and was given a favorable ethical opinion for conduct.
Utmost effort was utilized to prevent suffering and minimize the numbers of rats required for this experiment. All rats were 18 months old at the start of the experiment.
All diets were kept in a dry and dark place and administered fresh each day to the animals. Food intake was monitored daily around 10 am by weighting the amount of food administered to each cage and the amount remaining in the cage in the following day. Animal weight was monitored daily.
During the supplementation period, all animals were tested once a week on a standard X-maze alternation task described below. Rats were tested in a cross-maze apparatus as described previously [55]. Extramaze cues laboratory furniture, lights and several prominent visual features on the walls were held constant throughout the experiment.
Rats were first habituated to the maze apparatus for 4 consecutive days. During the habituation period the rats were starved overnight in order to motivate them to collect pellets of food from the maze, after which starvation overnight was ceased.
Following habituation, rats received 6 weeks of shaping sessions to assure that the animals could reliably collect rewards from the end of the maze arms before testing and supplementation begun.
As such, each rat received two shaping sessions per week. Each shaping session consisted of six trials. During each shaping trial, rats were trained to enter an open goal arm and collect a reward pellet from the food well of that goal arm entry to the alternate goal arm was restricted.
This process was repeated until the rat had completed 6 trials. Immediately after completion of the 6-week shapping period, test sessions were started. Each test session 8 trials contained a pseudo-random sequence of correct choices between the two arms, as well as a pseudo-random sequence for the start arm during the choice phase.
All rats were un-fasted during the procedure as the reward pellets provided sufficient motivation to ensure a high level of responding in the animals. Testing sessions were performed as described previously [23] with each animal receiving 8 trials per test session, with 5 minutes interval between trials.
Here, each trial consisted of a sample phase and a choice phase. During the sample phase, a rat was placed in the start arm and allowed access to only one goal arm, entry to the goal arm was rewarded with a pellet in the food well. Access to the alternate goal arm was restricted during this phase.
Once the reward pellet had been collected and eaten, the sample phase was over and the animal was placed back on the start arm for 10 seconds. During the choice phase, both goal arms could be accessed and the animal was allowed to make a free choice between these 2 arms.
However, the rat was only rewarded for entering the arm that it had not visited during the sample phase. An animal was deemed to have selected an arm when it had placed a hind foot down that arm; retracing before the hind foot crossed the line was measured as a failure on the task.
If the animal chose the correct arm, it was rewarded with a pellet in the food well. The animal was then returned to its cage for 5 minutes, before the next trial.
For each trial, choice accuracy was measured. The number of correct choices max 8 out of 8 trials was recorded for each testing session. Rats were given 6 test sessions in total on the cross-maze, one test session per week with the first session being administered immediately before supplementation was started baseline.
The weight of all animals was measured over course of the experiment, as well as the daily amount of food consumed. During the experiment a total of three animals died of natural causes, one from the control-diet group leaving the control group with a total of 7 subjects and two from the blueberry-supplemented group leaving the blueberry group with a total of 6 subjects.
Following the final test session animals were sacrificed by decapitation and their brains were immediately extracted and halved. Proteins were extracted using the Trizol method [56]as described previously [47] and optimized for the extraction of BDNF.
Protein concentration was determined by a Lowry based protein assay [57] Bio-Rad RC DC Protein Assay Bio-Rad, UK. For analysis of proteins by Western Immunoblotting, samples were incubated for 2 min at 95°C in boiling buffer final concentration: Bands were analyzed using the band analysis software UVISoft Band.
Molecular weights of the bands were calculated from comparison with pre-stained molecular weight markers MW 27,—, and MW 6,—45, BioRad that were run in parallel with the samples. GAPDH levels were used to normalize pro-BDNF and BDNF protein levels, as such relative band intensities were calculated as a ratio of BDNF or pro-BDNF and GAPDH levels.
Coronal sections 10 µm containing the dorsal hippocampus were cut using a cryostat, Bright Cryostat model OTF Huntingdon, UKand mounted onto poly-L-lysine coated microscope slides VWR, UK. Sections were then acetylated 0.
The methodology used was adapted from that described previously in [58]. Plasmid containing a fragment of rat BDNF cDNA bp cloned between the EcoRI and Sph1 site of pGEM4Z [59] was cut with Eco RI.
The riboprobes Antisense and Sense were transcribed from cDNA template using T7 RNA polymerase and simultaneously labeled with fluorosceinUTP Boehringer Mannheim, UK. In situ hybridization was conducted as described previously [47]. The relative mRNA levels in hippocampus and cortex were assessed by optical density measurements.
Images were captured using a CCD camera AxioCam MR3 Zeiss, UK connected to Microscope Zeiss — Imager A1 Axio Zeiss, UK.
All the microscope parameters were kept constant for all the sections Scaling 10X; Exposure 2. The densiometric analysis was carried out using Image J. The optical density of the several hippocampal subfields Dentate Gyrus- DG; Polymorphic cell layer- PCL; Cornu Ammonis 1- CA1; Cornu Ammonis3 — CA3 and cortex was measured from two sections per animal and 6 animals per group.
The mean optical density from each region in each section was corrected by subtracting the mean optical density of the background. The data is presented as mean ± S. M of the corrected optical density measurement within each group.
This was followed by post-hoc Tukey tests where appropriate.
: Anthocyanins and memory enhancement| Anthocyanin Supplements Enhance Memory | Ruo Chen FengRuo Chen Feng. Enhanceent, R. Thrivous Anthocyanins and memory enhancement Vitality Geroprotector to promote healthy memoru and metabolic function for Anthocyanis aging. USDA United States Department of Agriculture Database for the flavonoid content of selected foods. Vauzour D, Rendeiro C, Spencer JPE Flavonoids and cognition: the molecular mechanisms underlying their behavioural effects. The search was limited to articles in humans, published in English. |
| Introduction | Immediately after completion of the 6-week shapping period, test sessions were started. Inclusion of an anthocyanin-rich beverage may be a practical and feasible way to improve total anthocyanin consumption in older adults with mild-to-moderate dementia, with potential to improve specific cognitive outcomes. All procedures were conducted according to the specifications of the United Kingdom Animals Scientific Procedures Act, And those consuming more than 10mg per day were categorized as higher intake consumers. The methodology used was adapted from that described previously in [58]. Cancer Lett — |
| Enhance,ent IK, Yoo Anthocyanins and memory enhancement, Jung BK, Cho JH, Mejory DH, et Anthofyanins. Bondonno CP, Anthocyaninz E, Mubarak A, Hodgson Water weight elimination methods, Downey LA, Anthocyanins and memory enhancement KD, Scholey Anthlcyanins, Stough C, Enhacnement X, Considine MJ, Ward NC, Puddey IB The acute effect Pharmaceutical-grade ingredient innovation flavonoid-rich apples and nitrate-rich spinach on cognitive performance and mood in healthy men and women. In contrast, Caldwell et al. Kuriyama S, Hozawa A, Ohmori K, Shimazu T, Matsui T, et al. The effect of flavanol-rich cocoa on the fMRI response to a cognitive task in healthy young people. Receive exclusive offers and updates from Oxford Academic. The juice drink also induced a number of neuroendocrinological and physiological effects including increase in blood glucose concentration compared with control. | |
| Flavonoids | On the RAVLT, the higher anthocyanin consumer group recalled a greater number of words after a short delay and a distracter task B, 2. Further investigation of the protective role of the usual consumption of dietary anthocyanins for memory and cognition in pathological and normal aging appears warranted. Trial registration: This cross-sectional study uses baseline data from a randomized controlled trial registered with the Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry ACTRN Keywords: Anthocyanins; Cognition; Diet; Memory; Mild cognitive impairment. An acute cross-over study , for instance, found the blood pressure lowering effects of cherry juice over six hours were only seen if ml was consumed as a single serving, rather than as three ml servings over three hours. Lastly, it is likely that anthocyanins in food may interact with other nutrients, and combinations of foods may show synergistic effects. In other words, they may have a greater combined effect than if consumed in isolation. Quitting smoking, cutting down on saturated fat and being physically active are also crucial for keeping ageing brains healthy. Menu Close Home Edition Africa Australia Brasil Canada Canada français España Europe France Global Indonesia New Zealand United Kingdom United States. Edition: Available editions Europe. Become an author Sign up as a reader Sign in. Anthocyanins, which provide the red, blue and purple pigments, may help protect against cognitive decline. Karen Charlton , Katherine Kent , University of Wollongong. Authors Karen Charlton Associate Professor, School of Medicine, University of Wollongong Katherine Kent Nutritionist and PhD candidate, University of Wollongong. Flavonoids Flavonoids are nutrients that contain more than 6, unique compounds. Food and nutrition Memory Diet Dementia Fruit and vegetables Summer health Cognition. Events More events. Editorial Policies Community standards Republishing guidelines Analytics Our feeds Get newsletter Who we are Our charter Partners and funders Resource for media Contact us Consent preferences. During the experiment a total of three animals died of natural causes, one from the control-diet group leaving the control group with a total of 7 subjects and two from the blueberry-supplemented group leaving the blueberry group with a total of 6 subjects. Following the final test session animals were sacrificed by decapitation and their brains were immediately extracted and halved. Proteins were extracted using the Trizol method [56] , as described previously [47] and optimized for the extraction of BDNF. Protein concentration was determined by a Lowry based protein assay [57] Bio-Rad RC DC Protein Assay Bio-Rad, UK. For analysis of proteins by Western Immunoblotting, samples were incubated for 2 min at 95°C in boiling buffer final concentration: Bands were analyzed using the band analysis software UVISoft Band. Molecular weights of the bands were calculated from comparison with pre-stained molecular weight markers MW 27,—, and MW 6,—45,, BioRad that were run in parallel with the samples. GAPDH levels were used to normalize pro-BDNF and BDNF protein levels, as such relative band intensities were calculated as a ratio of BDNF or pro-BDNF and GAPDH levels. Coronal sections 10 µm containing the dorsal hippocampus were cut using a cryostat, Bright Cryostat model OTF Huntingdon, UK , and mounted onto poly-L-lysine coated microscope slides VWR, UK. Sections were then acetylated 0. The methodology used was adapted from that described previously in [58]. Plasmid containing a fragment of rat BDNF cDNA bp cloned between the EcoRI and Sph1 site of pGEM4Z [59] was cut with Eco RI. The riboprobes Antisense and Sense were transcribed from cDNA template using T7 RNA polymerase and simultaneously labeled with fluorosceinUTP Boehringer Mannheim, UK. In situ hybridization was conducted as described previously [47]. The relative mRNA levels in hippocampus and cortex were assessed by optical density measurements. Images were captured using a CCD camera AxioCam MR3 Zeiss, UK connected to Microscope Zeiss — Imager A1 Axio Zeiss, UK. All the microscope parameters were kept constant for all the sections Scaling 10X; Exposure 2. The densiometric analysis was carried out using Image J. The optical density of the several hippocampal subfields Dentate Gyrus- DG; Polymorphic cell layer- PCL; Cornu Ammonis 1- CA1; Cornu Ammonis3 — CA3 and cortex was measured from two sections per animal and 6 animals per group. The mean optical density from each region in each section was corrected by subtracting the mean optical density of the background. The data is presented as mean ± S. M of the corrected optical density measurement within each group. This was followed by post-hoc Tukey tests where appropriate. The BDNF in situ hybridization data was subjected to a one-way ANOVA for each brain region DG, PCL, CA1, CA3, Cortex with diet group Control, Blueberry, Anthocyanins, Flavanols as the main factor. Post-hoc Tukey tests were subsequently used to examine differences between individual treatments. For Immunoblot data, statistical comparisons were carried out using to a one-way ANOVA with diet group as the main factor. Post-hoc comparisons were made using Tukey's test. Correlation coefficients were calculated using the Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient. All the data is expressed as mean ± S. M and was analyzed using SPSS. On average, animals weighed On average, the blueberry-supplemented group consumed 7. Subsequent post hoc Tukey tests examining specific differences in performance between the individual diet groups indicated that there was a significant increase in choice accuracy between the control group and each diet control vs. B Comparison between animals performance at baseline and following 6 week supplementation with either a Control, Blueberry, Anthocyanins or Flavanol diet. Levels of hippocampal pro- and mature BDNF were assessed by Western immunoblotting and normalized against GAPDH protein levels Fig. A Dissected hippocampal tissue lysates were probed for levels of pro-BDNF and BDNF using antibodies that detect the pro-domain of the BDNF protein and the mature protein. Pro-BDNF grey bars and mature BDNF white bars. Pro-BDNF and mature BDNF were normalized against GAPDH. The hybridization pattern obtained for the BDNF probe was similar to that detected previously [60] , with all the principal hippocampal layers exhibiting BDNF mRNA expression, including the dentate granule cell layer in the dentate gyrus. A Dentate Gyrus DG white bars and Polymorphic Cell Layer PCL grey bars of the hippocampus, B Cortex, C CA1 D CA3. Representative pictures of hippocampal and cortical sections showing BDNF mRNA expression from 1 animal from the control C group, one from the BB group BB , one from the Anthocyanins group A and one from the Flavanols group F are presented. No significant differences between the four diet groups were observed in the cerebral cortex. Optical density levels are shown as mean ± SEM derived from at least 6 animals per group. Representative Rnase treated sections are presented for each hippocampal region. The scale presented represents µm. Flavonoid-rich foods such as blueberry, green tea and Gingko biloba have been shown to be highly effective at reversing age-related deficits in spatial memory and in the enhancement of different aspects of synaptic plasticity, [19] , [32] , [61] — [63] , a process severely affected by ageing [64] , [65]. Indeed, the changes in spatial memory induced by the pure flavonoids mimicked those induced by whole blueberry, suggesting that the flavonoids are likely to be responsible for the efficacy induced by the whole fruit in vivo. These findings were supported by observations that enhancements in spatial memory induced by the flavonoid-rich diets also significantly correlated with increases in hippocampal BDNF protein levels, suggesting that the effect of flavonoids on this neurotrophin may underpin performance on memory tasks. There is solid evidence indicating that hippocampal BDNF expression, in response to spatial memory training, is associated with memory performance [44] , [67] , [68]. BDNF has been shown to play a crucial role in synaptic plasticity, where it controls the stability of the hippocampal circuitry through its action in promoting changes in neuronal spine density and morphology [69] — [71]. Such morphological changes, stimulated by BDNF, dictate the efficiency of the synaptic connections and consequently affect spatial learning outputs [72]. Additionally, increases in neurotrophin expression may be also be important in determining neurogenesis [50] , with some data suggestive that BDNF plays an important role in modelling the neurovascular niche, particularly in the formation and maintenance of the vascular tube, which affects new neuronal proliferation and differentiation [73] , [74]. The elevation of hippocampal protein levels of BDNF by blueberry and pure flavonoids is particularly relevant as BDNF expression in the hippocampus is known to decrease with age in several mammalian species, including humans [42] , [43] , [75] , with these decreases associated with a decline in spatial memory [41] , [44] , [76]. Furthermore, these age-related alterations in BDNF expression appear to be region-and circuit specific [77] , [78]. We observed the greatest regulation of BDNF mRNA expression by pure anthocyanins in the CA1 region of the hippocampus, although levels were significantly increased in all hippocampal regions assessed. In contrast, blueberry and flavanol interventions did not appear to affect mRNA BDNF expression, despite the increases in protein levels detected in the hippocampus. Despite this, we observed a significant correlation between hippocampal protein levels of BDNF and levels of BDNF mRNA in the DG, CA1 and CA3 regions following intervention with all three of the flavonoid-containing diets, suggesting that the changes in BDNF protein are at least partly dependent on flavonoid-induced BDNF mRNA expression. Alternatively, flavanols present in the blueberry diet may act to increase hippocampal BDNF levels via alternative mechanisms, such as through BDNF stabilization rather than its de novo synthesis. Spatial learning is known to strongly increase the conversion of pro-BDNF into BDNF in both young and aged animals, with this process being typically down-regulated by ageing. As such, changes in BDNF protein levels in neurons do not always directly reflect changes in BDNF mRNA levels [80]. The increased expression of hippocampal protein BDNF levels seen after intervention with pure flavanols may be mediated by increases pro-BDNF metabolism during learning rather than via increases in pro-BDNF mRNA expression. In support of this, we observed lower levels of pro-BDNF in the flavanol group in comparison to the anthocyanin group albeit not significantly , suggesting increased pro-BDNF metabolism during learning for the flavanol group. Previously, we have observed an increase of mRNA BDNF in different regions of the hippocampus in young healthy animals, followed by an increase in both pro-BDNF and BDNF protein levels, suggesting that the flavonoids present in blueberry have the potential to stimulate both BDNF expression as well as BDNF stabilization [47]. However, a direct comparison between the effects of flavonoids in these two experiments is not trivial as the rats species used were different and age-dependent changes in BDNF are known to differ among rat species [81]. Thus, such an analysis would be valuable in future work to better understand how age differences impact on the potential effects of flavonoids on brain health. Although, the mechanisms by which flavonoids act in the brain are not clear, there is evidence to suggest that blueberry flavonoids can cross the blood-brain barrier BBB and reach the central nervous system, where they have the potential to directly regulate gene and protein expression in neurons [23] , [24] , [82]. However, at present it is unclear as to whether flavonoid-induced memory improvements are mediated exclusively centrally or whether other mechanisms such as stimulations in endothelial function and peripheral blood flow [83] also contribute. Such vascular effects are significant since it has been reported that increased cerebrovascular blood flow facilitates proliferation of neuronal cells in the hippocampus and this may influence memory [84]. As such, our data add weight to the evidence suggesting that flavonoids are the causal agents in determining the cognitive benefits of flavonoid-rich foods such as blueberry. Our data further support the view that such effects of flavonoids are determined at the molecular level in the hippocampus, where they are able to increase the expression of BDNF in specific regions of the hippocampus. Most notably, our data suggest that dietary amounts of flavanols and anthocyanins are capable of inducing both molecular and behavioral changes linked to memory in rats. As such, these compounds represent potential therapeutics that can counteract age-associated cognitive decline through dietary intervention or most importantly can play a crucial role in preventing age-related cognitive impairment. Conceived and designed the experiments: CR DV CMW LTB JPES. Performed the experiments: CR. Analyzed the data: CR JPES. Wrote the paper: CR CMW JPES. Extraction of anthocyanins from blueberries: PWT JMM. BDNF mRNA probe design and synthesis and assistance in situ hybridization techniques: MR. Browse Subject Areas? Click through the PLOS taxonomy to find articles in your field. Article Authors Metrics Comments Media Coverage Reader Comments Figures. Abstract Evidence suggests that flavonoid-rich foods are capable of inducing improvements in memory and cognition in animals and humans. Introduction Phytochemical—rich foods, particularly those rich in flavonoids, have been shown to be effective in reversing age-related deficits in memory and learning [1] — [6]. Materials and Methods Materials Antibodies used were anti-GAPDH New England Biolabs, Hitchin, UK ; anti-BDNF Santa Cruz Biotechnology, Santa Cruz, CA ; anti-pro-BDNF, Millipore, Warford, UK. Intervention diets Diets were prepared by Research Diets Inc. Animals and supplementation All procedures were conducted according to the specifications of the United Kingdom Animals Scientific Procedures Act, Spatial Memory Testing Habituation and Shaping Sessions. Alternation task. Tissue collection Following the final test session animals were sacrificed by decapitation and their brains were immediately extracted and halved. Western Immunoblotting Proteins were extracted using the Trizol method [56] , as described previously [47] and optimized for the extraction of BDNF. Preparation of brain sections Coronal sections 10 µm containing the dorsal hippocampus were cut using a cryostat, Bright Cryostat model OTF Huntingdon, UK , and mounted onto poly-L-lysine coated microscope slides VWR, UK. In situ hybridization riboprobes The methodology used was adapted from that described previously in [58]. In situ hybridization In situ hybridization was conducted as described previously [47]. Download: PPT. Figure 1. Effect of 6 weeks blueberry BB , Anthocyanins Extract A and Flavanols F on spatial working memory in aged rats 18 months old. Modulation of BDNF and pro-BDNF protein levels in the hippocampus Levels of hippocampal pro- and mature BDNF were assessed by Western immunoblotting and normalized against GAPDH protein levels Fig. Figure 2. Levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor BDNF in the hippocampus. Changes in hippocampal BDNF mRNA levels The hybridization pattern obtained for the BDNF probe was similar to that detected previously [60] , with all the principal hippocampal layers exhibiting BDNF mRNA expression, including the dentate granule cell layer in the dentate gyrus. Figure 3. Effects of blueberry supplementation in BDNF mRNA levels in the hippocampus and cortex. Discussion Flavonoid-rich foods such as blueberry, green tea and Gingko biloba have been shown to be highly effective at reversing age-related deficits in spatial memory and in the enhancement of different aspects of synaptic plasticity, [19] , [32] , [61] — [63] , a process severely affected by ageing [64] , [65]. Author Contributions Conceived and designed the experiments: CR DV CMW LTB JPES. References 1. Letenneur L, Proust-Lima C, Le Gouge A, Dartigues JF, Barberger-Gateau P Flavonoid intake and cognitive decline over a year period. Am J Epidemiol — View Article Google Scholar 2. Patel AK, Rogers JT, Huang X Flavanols, mild cognitive impairment, and Alzheimer's dementia. Int J Clin Exp Med 1: — |
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