Why is everyone so concerned about getting Vit E and C to the brain.  If you
think that antioxidants will help, just take lipoic acid.  It not only
reaches the brain, it has been shown to reach the substantia nigra.  It is a
very powerful antioxidant and it recycles E which recycles C.

Plus it generates L-glutatione which is scarce in PD people.  It also
chelates Iron.

Builds strong brains in 4 ways!

                        Ron Reiner (49/2)
At 03:15 AM 12/3/97 -0400, you wrote:
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>Getting Vitamin C on the Brain
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>
>NEW YORK (Reuters) -- Vitamin C levels are 10 times higher in the brain
>than they are elsewhere in the body, and now researchers think they know
>the reason why.
>
>A particular chemical form of vitamin C -- called dehydroascorbic acid --
>can slip past the blood brain barrier, resulting in higher concentrations
>of the antioxidant in the central nervous system.
>
>"Our findings in this study suggest that vitamin C concentrations in the
>brain could be increased by increasing the blood concentration of
>dehydroascorbic acid," reported lead author Dr. David Agus, an oncologist
>at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York.
>
>Manipulating vitamin C levels in the brain may turn out to be helpful in
>combating Alzheimer's disease or other neurological disorders.
>
>Vitamin C tends to mop up free radicals, damaging particles that might
>contribute to neurological damage, according to the report in the Journal
>of Clinical Investigation.
>
>"We now know how to get large amounts of an antioxidant into the brain,"
>said Agus.
>Ascorbic acid, the form of vitamin C absorbed from the intestines, is
>unable to cross the blood brain barrier.
>
>The barrier is a network of capillaries that prevents most chemicals from
>gaining access to the sensitive central nervous system.
>
>However, Agus and colleagues found that when ascorbic acid was converted to
>dehydroascorbic acid it could be ferried across the blood brain barrier by
>a transporter molecule.
>
>Such transporters are found on cells lining the blood brain barrier, and
>can transport compounds into the brain and spinal cord.
>
>In the case of dehydroascorbic acid it was the GLUT1, which normally
>transports glucose, that moved the vitamin.
>
>Once inside the brain dehydroascorbic acid is converted back into ascorbic
>acid -- thus explaining the mystery of high vitamin C concentrations in the
>brain.
>
>
>By Theresa Tamkins
>SOURCE: Journal of Clinical Investigation (1997;100)
>1997 Reuters Health eLine
><http://www.medscape.com/reuters/tue/t1201-1f.html>
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>
>janet [log in to unmask]
>
>