Alzheimer’s disease continues to mystify the medical community, leaving unanswered questions on risk factors, memory loss, and potential triggers. As type 3 diabetes becomes a more prevalent term in the scientific community, fructose has emerged as a potential cause for cell death and damage that initiates the Alzheimer’s cascade. Researchers have determined that Alzheimer’s disease may be driven by the over-activation of fructose made in the brain, a sugar found in fruits, juices, vegetables, and some honey. This natural fructose reduces the energy production of mitochondria in your brain cells, leading to a progressive loss of energy levels required for your brain neurons to remain functional. Ultimately, more neuronal dysfunction occurs as energy-generating mitochondria are lost.
Scientists at Yale University have examined the causal factors for increased levels of natural fructose production in the brain. Their theory posits that glucose consumption is the issue, not eating fruits high in fructose that migrate across the blood-brain barrier. The research team gave eight healthy, lean individuals glucose infusions over four hours and measured their sugar concentrations in the brain and blood using magnetic resonance spectroscopy. The results showed that cerebral fructose levels significantly increase in response to a glucose infusion with minimal changes in blood fructose levels.
When glucose is consumed, brain fructose levels rise due to a metabolic pathway called the polyol pathway. The metabolic pathway converts glucose to fructose, destroying the energy production of mitochondria, killing brain neurons, and initiating the Alzheimer’s cascade. Understanding this information is critical, as merely reducing fructose consumption does not address dietary consumption. Instead, limiting sugar consumption overall decreases fructose production in the brain, which can protect energy production and help neurons fire at a healthy rate.
