Turmeric: protects and regenerates neurons

Turmerone, a compound found in turmeric, can stimulate brain stem cell proliferation and promote the growth of new neurons, in laboratory animals. Turmerone is therefore a candidate as a future drug to support cell regeneration in neurological disorders.

This is the discovery made by Dr. Adele Rueger and her colleagues at the Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine in Jülich, Germany. The research, published in the journal Stem Cell Research & Therapy, investigated the effects of turmerone on neural stem cells in vitro and in vitro.

The effects of turmeric

Curcuma longa is a spice with several beneficial properties. Curcumin and turmerone are two of its main bioactive compounds. Many studies have shown that curcumin possesses anti-inflammatory and neuroprotective properties. The effects of turmerone, however, remain to be elucidated. It is attributed with anti-cancer and anti-inflammatory properties of neuronal tissue. In particular, it appears that it may prevent the activation of microglia cells, brain cells that induce neuroinflammation associated with various disorders such as neurodegenerative diseases and stroke.

Turmerone increases brain stem cell growth

Because it constitutes a promising therapeutic agent for various neurological disorders this research tested the action of turmerone on neural stem cells, which differentiate into neurons and play an important role in brain self-repair. Cultured rat neural stem cells were treated with six (3.125 to 25 μg/mL) different concentrations of turmerone. 

After three days, the treatment resulted in an increase in the number of neuronal stem cells due to an increase in their proliferation. In fact, treatment with certain concentrations of turmerone significantly increased the percentage of proliferating stem cells from 50 percent to 80 percent . The team then tested the effects of turmerone in vivo. PET scanning, a nuclear medicine and diagnostic technique used to produce images of the body, revealed, in animals injected with the compound, the expansion of the subventricular area and hippocampus, the areas of the brain where new neurons are born in adult mammals.

Turmerone as a treatment option?

The study shows that turmerone is able to increase the number of neural stem cells both in cell culture and on the brains of adult rats. This increase is due to increased proliferation of neural stem cells and leads to the emergence of new neurons during differentiation. While several substances have been described to promote brain stem cell proliferation, few are known to promote stem cell differentiation into neuronal cells, which is an important goal in regenerative medicine. The results on turmerone represent a step toward achieving this goal. 

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Source: Joerg Hucklenbroich, Rebecca Klein, Bernd Neumaier, Rudolf Graf, Gereon Rudolf Fink, Michael Schroeter, and Maria Adele Rueger "Aromatic-turmerone induces neural stem cell proliferation in vitro and in vivo." Stem Cell Res Ther. 2014; 5(4): 100.