Professor Jeff Abbott is the Indiana Jones of botany. He leads expeditions to unexplored parts of the earth to find medicinal treasures: herbal remedies used by indigenous peoples. These drugs may contain life-saving chemicals that could revolutionize the treatment of serious diseases.
These expeditions take Jeff Abbott, a professor of physiology and biophysics at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), to the wilderness of the Mojave Desert and Yosemite National Park in the United States, as well as to Hawaii, the Virgin Islands, and along the Pacific Coast. I will visit. He was originally from Canada, all a long way from Norfolk, where he grew up.
“This is a place where you need a satellite phone and a survival kit. It’s a very remote place,” he told Good Health.
Back in the lab, Professor Abbott has also researched how staple foods such as rosemary, thyme, coriander, lavender and chamomile can treat conditions as diverse as epilepsy, high blood pressure, infections and even drug addiction. I’m doing it.
Herbal remedies have often been dismissed by skeptics as having no more scientific support than magic or spell-weaving.
“These are places where you need a satellite phone and a survival kit. They’re very remote places,” Professor Geoff Abbott told Good Health.
But in the UCI lab, Professor Abbott and his team are using cutting-edge science to uncover the power of medicinal herbs.
Specifically, how chemicals found in traditionally used herbs can cure serious conditions by repairing faults in the microscopic electrical switches that permeate our bodies. I’m researching whether it’s possible.
These electrical switches are called ion channels. They are located in the outer membrane of protein cells found throughout the human body and determine the strength of the internal charge. This level of charge determines how the protein functions.
Proteins themselves play an important role in regulating the electrical signals that enable our nervous system and organs such as the brain, heart, and muscles to function.
Ion channel switches allow ions (charged atoms) to enter protein cells whenever they are needed to charge the protein cell. The level of charge inside a protein determines how strongly the protein interacts with other components of the nervous system.
The reason some spider, scorpion, or snake bites are so dangerous is because the venom can interfere with the victim’s ion channels and shut down the nervous system.
Similarly, incorrectly overactive or underactive ion channel switches can lead to various diseases such as epilepsy, hypertension, and even drug addiction.
Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones
Professor Abbott’s research shows that chemicals found in common herbs can repair ion switches that have malfunctioned for any reason, including genetic defects, injury, disease, and addiction.
Some can get the low activity ion switch working properly again. Others turn off the hyperactivity switch.
“We have 2,000 plant extracts that we are currently screening,” Professor Abbott says.
Some famous plants are showing promise. For example, research from his lab reported in the journal FASEB (Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology) found that coriander contains the chemical dodecanal, which may reduce epileptic seizures. Dodecanol alters ion channels in brain cells, reducing excitability. Epileptic seizures may occur as a result of excessive excitability of brain cells.
Coriander has been used for centuries in folk medicine in Southeast Asia and North Africa to relieve seizures. It was discovered in the tomb of Tutankhamun. However, until this publication, no one knew scientifically how coriander acts on epilepsy.
Professor Abbott said: “This discovery could lead to more effective use of coriander as an anticonvulsant, or modification of dodecanol to develop more effective anticonvulsants.”
His research is often inspired by the continued use of medicinal plants by indigenous peoples.
Recently, his team has been working with the Kwakawa’wakhu people of Canada’s Pacific Coast to treat ataxia, a group of neurological disorders that affect balance, coordination, and language.
According to the charity Ataxia UK, at least 10,000 adults and 500 children in the UK have some form of the condition.
Professor Abbott’s team discovered two compounds in plants, tannic acid and gallic acid, that can repair defective ion channels in nerve proteins that cause symptoms.
“These are the first plant compounds known to do this. No synthetic compound can do this,” Professor Abbott says. “You can’t swallow tannic acid because it makes you feel sick. But you can rub it into your skin. Gallic acid is even more interesting because it’s already commercially available in supplements like Bladder Kelp. Toxicity studies have shown it to be safe.
It’s not clear why the Kwakawawa’wakw needed a treatment for ataxia, Professor Abbott says, “but it may be because ataxia can be caused by an infectious disease.”
“They may also have contracted the disease from ingesting hallucinogenic plants that are revered in indigenous medicine and shamanism, which can cause ataxia if taken in excess.”
Rosemary, on the other hand, holds promise as a treatment for cocaine addiction. It contains carnosic acid, which is already known to open ion channels in the brain.
Professor Abbott explains: “My colleagues said they found that these same brain ion channels were shut down in laboratory mice addicted to cocaine.”
So Professor Abbott set up an experiment in which mice were forced to push down on a pair of bars to drink a drink. One drink was dosed with cocaine and the other drink was not dosed with cocaine.
“The mice quickly learned to press the cocaine drink bar because it was more fun.”
However, results recently published in the journal Neuron show that when mice were given carnosic acid, they stopped choosing cocaine bars.
Why does this work? According to Professor Abbott, one theory is that acid releases memory formation in cocaine addicts, and that memory is hardwired into compulsively craving the drug. .
Rosemary has long been known to enhance memory. “There is evidence to suggest that it may be worth trying rosemary extract to improve memory test results,” Professor Abbott says.
“Carnosic acid can be purchased as a supplement. It crosses the body’s blood-brain barrier. [which keeps out chemicals and infections] So it can actually affect your brain cells. ”
Thyme also holds promise as a treatment for fungal infections that are becoming increasingly resistant to conventional medicines.
Professor Abbott says, “Thyme has been used historically as a fungicide, but no one knew how it worked,” and that it blocks ion channels in Candida fungal infections. discovered a small molecule that [e.g. thrush]. Since Candida only has one of these ion channels, it is very important that Candida stays alive. ”
Candida normally lives harmlessly on your skin, mouth, throat, intestines, and vagina. However, if they grow out of control or invade deep into the body, they can cause infections. “Our trials showed that small molecules from thyme effectively inhibited the most common type of Candida albicans,” Professor Abbott says.
This is particularly timely as Candida strains are becoming resistant to conventional antifungal drugs.
Candida auris, one of the newly emerging drug-resistant strains, was first identified in Japan in 2009. Since then, the pathogen has spread to more than 40 countries, killing between 30 and 60 percent of those infected.
In 2017, an outbreak occurred at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust, affecting 70 patients. It took two and a half years for the hospital to be free of infection.
Humans and fungi share significant amounts of DNA, making it difficult to invent antifungal drugs that kill fungi without damaging human tissue, experts have warned.
However, Professor Abbott says, “The ion channels affected by the time molecule are not found in mammals.” This means it can be safely used to kill candida infections without any side effects. ”
Now his team hopes to develop a synthetic, more powerful version of the thyme molecule.
But while researchers are working to discover the molecular mechanisms behind therapeutic herbs, Professor Abbott says, “In some cases it may actually be better to use the whole plant.” “Our research suggests that there may be other chemicals in plants that work in concert with the chemicals we discovered to make phytotherapy more effective.” is common.”
So raid the food stores and, as the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates said, “Make food your medicine.”
