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SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY 2: Teas May Prevent Alzheimer’s Disease

A new study conducted in England suggests that green and black teas may inhibit some of the brain’s enzymes that can cause Alzheimer’s disease. Alzheimer’s disease occurs when the nerve cells of the brain that process information get less useful and die. Proteins form on these brain cells that eventually kill them.

Scientists steeped the teas in boiling water from 30 to 45 minutes, then cooled the tea to room temperature and freeze-dried them to preserve the make-up of the teas. No sugar, milk or other additions were mixed with the tea.

By studying the affects of black tea, green tea and coffee, researchers found that the teas stopped the activity of the chemicals in the brain that create the onset of Alzheimer’s. Coffee, the study found, was not effective in preventing the disease. Researchers say that they don’t know how to explain the teas’ effects, and they have seen no research that Alzheimer’s disease is lower in countries that drink lots of tea.

While the teas aren’t being seen as a miracle cure for the disease, they are being seen as possible treatments to delay the disease.

--Written by Katie Denbo

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