Resveratrol, the anti-oxidant polyphenol found in red wine, may have a role in limiting damage during and after a specific category of stroke called “ischemic” stroke. This category of stroke results from an inadequate supply of blood to a particular area of the brain, most commonly resulting from a blood clot. The process releases free radical oxygen molecules which can damage or destroy neurons. This conclusion was drawn by researchers at The Johns Hopkins University in Maryland and by associate professor Sylvain Dore who led the study and presented the data at the Annual Society of Neuroscience Conference in October of 2006.

The study was performed on mice some of whom were fed resveratrol and some just water and then induced to suffer a stroke. Those mice fed the highest dose of resveratrol had a 30-40% reduction in neuronal cell death. Neurons cultured in a Petri dish and pretreated with resveratrol were more likely to be protected from induced stroke like conditions.

“Resveratrol assists
in protecting
 neuron cells.”

Dore and his team also noted that resveratrol seemed to induce the enzyme heme-oxygenase, which assists in protecting neuron cells. The team hypothesized that consuming up to two drinks of red wine per day may reduce the damage from a stroke. The team also cautioned that the results have not been extended to and proven in human clinical trials.

Resveratrol May Kill Pancreatic Cancer Cells:

In the March, 2008 edition of Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology, a study was performed by Paul Okunieff, MD, Chief of Radiation Oncology at the James P. Wilmot Cancer Center at the Univeristy of Rochester Medical Center that suggested that the polyphenol compound resveratrol might be influential in destroying pancreatic cancer cells. It was assumed that resveratrol performed its actions through crippling the energy source of the cells, the mitochondria. Pancreatic cells pretreated with resveratrol and subsequently irradiated underwent a process called apoptosis, a form of cell death. Researchers noted that the resveratrol appeared to reduce the protein function of the cells responsible for pumping chemotherapeutic agents out of the cell. By adding resveratrol to irradiation, the cells were less likely to pump out the chemotherapeutic drugs. Resveratrol also increases the production of a compound called reactive oxygen species which causes the cells to die and depolarizes the cell membrane reducing it potential to function.

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Tags: free radical, pancreatic cancer, polyphenol, Resveratrol, stroke