Resesarchers Confirm Suspicions About Fructose And HFCS

[tex]

This research, if it is upheld, paints a rather bleak picture regarding the use of high fructose corn syrup. HFCS is an ingredient that has been consumed in relatively large quantities by most residents of developed countries for many years. Now researchers tell us that it can cause damage to hundreds of brain genes, leading to all sorts of dire consequences. Why wasn't this research done decades ago before HFCS became so widely used? Why was the FDA asleep at the wheel (as usual)?

And if I am reading this information correctly, this doesn't just implicate HFCS — it also implicates all other sources of fructose, including many fruits and some vegetables. But the research article also points out that omega-3 fatty acid docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) can reverse the damage. The problem is that most western diets don't contain much of it.

A range of diseases — from diabetes to cardiovascular disease, and from Alzheimer’s disease to attention deficit hyperactivity disorder — are linked to changes to genes in the brain. A new study by UCLA life scientists has found that hundreds of those genes can be damaged by fructose, a sugar that’s common in the Western diet, in a way that could lead to those diseases.

Other tests on the rats revealed more major differences: The rats receiving a high-fructose diet had much higher blood glucose, triglycerides and insulin levels than the other two groups. Those results are significant because in humans, elevated glucose, triglycerides and insulin are linked to obesity, diabetes and many other diseases.

The research team sequenced more than 20,000 genes in the rats’ brains, and identified more than 700 genes in the hypothalamus (the brain’s major metabolic control center) and more than 200 genes in the hippocampus (which helps regulate learning and memory) that were altered by the fructose. The altered genes they identified, the vast majority of which are comparable to genes in humans, are among those that interact to regulate metabolism, cell communication and inflammation.

Fructose alters hundreds of brain genes, which can lead to a wide range of diseases

You can view the original research paper at the link below:

Systems Nutrigenomics Reveals Brain Gene Networks Linking Metabolic and Brain Disorders

Based on that research, if I were a rat I believe I'd stop eatin' the dang stuff.

Tex

[Erica P-G]

Yikes....I know I'm trying to wean off of it. I think I only get HFCS in my Mini Mtn Dew these days.

Talk about a cheap way to affect ALL people on the planet (those who can obtain items with the HFCS in it). It brings back memories of stories told at Christmas about how much of a treat it was to get a piece of candy in a stocking. Sugar didn't used to be such a hit, as it is the norm these days. Now days I try not to give any candy in a stocking!