Resveratrol and Alzheimer’s disease: message in a bottle on red wine and cognition

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Wine Ingredient May Have Few Health Benefits

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http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fnagi.2014.00095/full?
Alberto Granzotto¹ and Paolo Zatta^2*

• ¹Molecular Neurology Unit, Center of Excellence on Aging (Ce.S.I.), Chieti, Italy
• ²CNR-Institute for Biomedical Technologies, Padua “Metalloproteins” Unit, Department of Biology, University of Padua, Padua, Italy

Cognitive impairment is the final outcome of a complex network of molecular mechanisms ultimately leading to dementia. Despite major efforts aimed at unraveling the molecular determinants of dementia of Alzheimer type (DAT), effective disease-modifying approaches are still missing. An interesting and still largely unexplored avenue is offered by nutraceutical intervention. For instance, robust epidemiological data have suggested that moderate intake of red wine may protect against several age-related pathological conditions (i.e., cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, and cancer) as well as DAT-related cognitive decline. Wine is highly enriched in many polyphenols, including resveratrol. Resveratrol is a well recognized antioxidant which may modulate metal ion deregulation outcomes as well as main features of the Alzheimer’s disease (AD) brain. The review will discuss the potentiality of resveratrol as a neuroprotectant in dementia in relation to the oxidative stress produced by amyloid and metal dysmetabolism.

Introduction

The so-called French paradox arises from the epidemiological fact that French people, despite their indulgence to a high fat diet, show a relative low incidence of cardiovascular diseases (Renaud and De Lorgeril, 1992). Several epidemiological studies have shown that moderate wine consumption can be effective in slowing down age-related cognitive decline (Wang et al., 2006; Panza et al., 2012; Corona et al., 2013). A possible explanation of this phenomenon has been linked to the national high consumption of wine (20–30 g/day) (Renaud and De Lorgeril, 1992). Albeit moderate ethanol intake is, generally speaking, “beneficial”, some more specific effects appear to be related to red wine. Red wine consumption seems in fact to promote far more protective effects than consumption of other ethanol containing beverages (Baur and Sinclair, 2006). Resveratrol, a natural polyphenol, is mainly present in red wine and has been suspected to be the major driving force behind the French paradox (Siemann and Creasy, 1992).

AD is one of the most common forms of dementia in the elderly. To date, no disease-modifying therapies are still available for AD.

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