Protect your brain from Alzheimer's risk; eat foods enriched with extra-virgin olive oil!

 New Delhi: Known as the healthiest fat on Earth, the health benefits provided by olive oil are unrivaled. In fact, olive oil is largely preferred over normal cooking oil, when it comes to food.

It lowers heart disease risk, eliminates cardiovascular problems, maintains healthy cholesterol levels, helps prevent strokes, reduces breast cancer risk, etc.

Extending this list, a study has added that extra-virgin olive oil also has the ability to protect against Alzheimer's disease.

Consuming a diet enriched with extra-virgin olive oil may protect memory and learning ability, and prevent Alzheimer's disease, the study claims.

The Mediterranean diet includes olive oil as a main ingredient and is rich in plant-based foods. It is associated with a variety of health benefits, including a lower incidence of dementia.

Researchers at the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University (LKSOM) in the US identified a specific ingredient that protects against cognitive decline: extra- virgin olive oil, a major component of the Mediterranean diet.

In a study published in the journal Annals of Clinical and Translational Neurology, researchers show that the consumption of extra-virgin olive oil reduces the formation of amyloid-beta plaques and neurofibrillary tangles in the brain - classic markers of Alzheimer's disease.

The team also identified the mechanisms underlying the protective effects of extra-virgin olive oil.

"We found that olive oil reduces brain inflammation but most importantly activates a process known as autophagy," said Domenico Pratico, Professor at LKSOM.

Autophagy is the process by which cells break down and clear out intracellular debris and toxins, such as amyloid plaques and tau tangles.

"Brain cells from mice fed diets enriched with extra- virgin olive oil had higher levels of autophagy and reduced levels of amyloid plaques and phosphorylated tau," Pratico said.

Phosphorylated tau, is responsible for neurofibrillary tangles, which are suspected of contributing to the nerve cell dysfunction in the brain that is responsible for Alzheimer's memory symptoms.

In order to investigate the relationship between extra- virgin olive oil and dementia, researchers used a well- established Alzheimer's disease mouse model.

Known as a triple transgenic model, the animals develop three key characteristics of the disease: memory impairment, amyloid plagues, and neurofibrillary tangles.

The researchers divided the animals into two groups, one that received a chow diet enriched with extra-virgin olive oil and one that received the regular chow diet without it.

The olive oil was introduced into the diet when the mice were six months old, before symptoms of Alzheimer's disease begin to emerge in the animal model.

In overall appearance, there was no difference between the two groups of animals. However, at age nine months and 12 months, mice on the extra virgin olive oil-enriched diet performed significantly better on tests designed to evaluate working memory, spatial memory, and learning abilities.

Studies of brain tissue from both groups of mice revealed dramatic differences in nerve cell appearance and function.

The integrity of the connections between neurons, known as synapses, were preserved in animals on the extra-virgin olive oil diet.

In addition, compared to mice on a regular diet, brain cells from animals in the olive oil group showed a dramatic increase in nerve cell autophagy activation, which was ultimately responsible for the reduction in levels of amyloid plaques and phosphorylated tau.

(With PTI inputs)