High-fructose diet hampers recovery from traumatic brain injury

A diet high in processed fructose sabotages rats’ brains’ ability to heal after head trauma, UCLA neuroscientists report. Revealing a link between nutrition and brain health, the finding offers implications for the 5.3 million Americans living with a traumatic brain injury, or TBI. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an estimated 1.7 million people suffer a TBI each year, resulting in 52,000 annual deaths “Americans consume most of their fructose from processed foods sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup,” said Fernando Gomez-Pinilla, a professor of neurosurgery and integrative biology and physiology at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine. “We found that processed fructose inflicts surprisingly harmful effects on the brain’s ability to repair itself after a head trauma.” Fructose also occurs naturally in fruit, which contains antioxidants, fiber and other nutrients that prevent the same damage. In the UCLA study, published today in the Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow and Metabolism, laboratory rats were fed standard rat chow and trained for five days to escape a maze. Then they were randomly assigned to a group that was fed plain water or a group that was fed fructose-infused water for six weeks. The fructose was crystallized from corn in a dose simulating a human diet high in foods and drinks sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup. A week later, the rats were anesthetized and underwent a brief pulse of fluid to the head to reprod...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news