Always eating processed foods will make the brain lose memory?

▎The editors of WuXi AppTec's content team go to the convenience store to buy bread or order takeaway when they have a meal
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It is a normal life for many people .

Most of the student party and office workers can't buy fresh vegetables and meat at the vegetable market every day, and busy in the kitchen all day long
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Therefore, the food we buy or eat every day is more or less processed
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Although processed foods are convenient and delicious, they also have various potential health hazards
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A new study found that feeding highly processed foods for 4 weeks can cause a strong inflammatory response in the brain of elderly rats, accompanied by obvious signs of memory loss
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The good news is that research has also found that as long as the omega-3 fatty acid DHA is added to the diet, it can effectively slow down or prevent the damage to the brain from processed foods
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▲The paper was published in the "Brain, Behavior, and Immunity" magazine (picture source: screenshot of the paper page) DHA, or docosahexaenoic acid, is an omega-3 fatty acid, usually found in fish and other seafood products In
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DHA is an important component of the plasma membrane of gray matter neurons in the cerebral cortex, and it is very important in the mechanism of promoting and regulating neurodevelopment
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In addition, DHA also has the effect of resisting inflammation in the brain
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Previous studies have found that short-term high-fat diets can cause memory loss and brain inflammation in elderly animals, and cause the hippocampus, which controls memory, and the amygdaloid nucleus, which is responsible for the emotion-fear response.
DHA level
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Therefore, researchers at Ohio State University wanted to know what changes in the aging brain might be triggered by a processed diet, and what effect would DHA supplementation play in the diet
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Image source: 123RF In a 4-week experiment, the research team let male rats aged 3 months and 24 months receive a normal diet (32% protein, 54% complex carbohydrates, 14% fat), highly processed, respectively.
Diet (19.
6% protein, 63.
3% refined carbohydrates, 17.
1% fat), or the same processed diet with DHA
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These processed diets mimic human foods with a long shelf life, such as potato chips, frozen pizza, and deli meats containing preservatives
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Processed diets are often associated with obesity and type 2 diabetes
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The experimental results did show that, compared with the normal diet group, the two processed diet groups had significant weight gain, and the weight of the elderly animals was significantly higher than that of the young animals
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Compared with the other two groups, in the hippocampus and amygdala of aged rats fed processed food alone, the activation of genes related to potent pro-inflammatory proteins and other inflammatory markers was significantly increased, such as IL-1β, CD11b , MHC class II, CD86, nlrp3 and complement component 3
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Not only that, old rats also showed signs of memory loss in behavioral experiments.
They would forget to stay in the same place a few days ago, indicating that there was a problem with the contextual memory of the hippocampus, and they did not show the expected fear of dangerous clues.
Behavior, indicating that the amygdala is also abnormal
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These phenomena were not observed in young rats
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 ▲DHA can prevent the increase in hippocampus and amygdala inflammatory gene expression induced by processed food (picture source: reference [1]) However, experiments have also found that adding DHA to processed food can effectively prevent the increase in the brain of old rats Inflammatory response and resist memory loss
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However, DHA supplementation has no preventive effect on weight gain associated with eating highly processed foods
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 ▲DHA supplementation can effectively inhibit the damage of processed foods to the brain (picture source: Reference [1]) The corresponding author of the paper, Professor Ruth Barrientos, commented: “These findings indicate that processed diets can produce significant and sudden memory deficits.
This is especially noticeable in the population with high levels of dysfunction
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Rapid memory decline may progress to more serious neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease
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Restrict processed foods in the diet or increase the intake of foods rich in omega-3 fatty acids DHA.
It can prevent or slow down this progress, but it cannot resist the impact of processed foods on weight
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” The researchers pointed out that although DHA supplements can counter the effects of processed foods on memory and inflammation in the brain, the fundamental health lies in adjustment.
The overall diet structure is to consciously minimize the proportion of processed foods in the daily diet, and the intake of refined carbohydrates, and eat more nutritious and healthy foods
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In the future, they hope to further explore specific DHA dosages that can prevent the effects of processed diets
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References: [1] Butler, MJ, et, al.
(2021).
Dietary DHA prevents cognitive impairment and inflammatory gene expression in aged male rats fed a diet enriched with refined carbohydrates.
Brain, Behavior, and Immunity, 98, 198– 209.
https://doi.
org/10.
1016/j.
bbi.
2021.
08.
214[2] How highly processed foods harm memory in the aging brain.
Retrieved October 14, 2021, from https:// news-releases/931544