The key to protecting your memory could also be a staple of a bodybuilder’s eating regimen. RUSH researchers recently discovered that a muscle-building complement called beta-hydroxy beta-methylbutyrate, also called HMB, may help protect memory, reduce plaques and ultimately help prevent the progression of Alzheimer’s disease.
HMB will not be a prescription drug or a steroid, but an over-the-counter complement that is out there in sports and fitness stores. Bodybuilders repeatedly use HMB to extend exercise-induced gains in muscle size and strength while improving exercise performance. HMB is taken into account secure even after long-term use, with no known negative effects.
“This may occasionally be one in all the safest and the simplest approaches to halt disease progression and protect memory in Alzheimer’s disease patients,” said Kalipada Pahan, PhD, the Floyd A. Davis, MD, Professor of Neurology and professor of neurological sciences, biochemistry and pharmacology at RUSH Medical College.
Studies in mice with Alzheimer’s disease have shown that HMB successfully reduces plaques and increases aspects for neuronal growth to guard learning and memory, based on neurological researchers at RUSH.
“Understanding how the disease works is essential to developing effective drugs to guard the brain and stop the progression of Alzheimer’s disease,” Pahan said.
Previous studies indicate that a family of proteins often called neurotrophic aspects are drastically decreased within the brains of individuals with Alzheimer’s disease and have been found to assist in survival and performance of neurons, that are cells that receive and send messages from the body to the brain and vice versa.
“Our study found that after oral consumption, HMB enters into the brain to extend these helpful proteins, restore neuronal connections and improve memory and learning in mice with Alzheimer’s-like pathology, equivalent to plaques and tangles,” Pahan said.
The study findings indicate that HMB stimulates a nuclear hormone receptor called PPARα inside the brain that regulates the transport of fatty acids, which is essential to the success of HMB as a neuroprotective complement.
“If mouse results with HMB are replicated in Alzheimer’s disease patients, it could open up a promising avenue of treatment of this devastating neurodegenerative disease,” Pahan said.
Alzheimer’s disease is an irreversible, progressive brain disease that slowly destroys memory and considering skills and, eventually, even the power to perform the best tasks. In most individuals with Alzheimer’s, symptoms first appear after age 60. Alzheimer’s disease is essentially the most common reason for dementia amongst older people, affecting as many as 6 million Americans and greater than 10% of individuals age 65 and older. About two-thirds of Americans with Alzheimer’s disease are women.
Results from the study, funded by the National Institutes of Health, were recently published within the Cell Reports.
Other RUSH researchers involved on this study are Ramesh K. Paidi, PhD, Sumita Raha, PhD, and Avik Roy, PhD.
Source:
Rush University Medical Center
Journal reference:
https://www.cell.com/cell-reports/fulltext/S2211-1247(23)00728-3