X-Message-Number: 18372
From: "Peter Christiansen" <>
Date: Fri, 18 Jan 2002 16:38:49 -0600

This item, from WEB MD 1/18/02 suggests a major breakthrough in 
psychopharmacology may be imminent. One of the major problems with 
psychotropic medications e.g. anti-depressant medications, is that they 
often take weeks to "set up" or become effective. This research indicates 
that time could be shorted to hours or even minutes.

Peter Christiansen






Vitamin C May Improve Alzheimer's Treatments

Nutrient Helps Drugs Cross the Blood-Brain Barrier, Get Into Cells
By   Liza Jane Maltin




Jan. 14, 2002 -- A major stumbling block to treating brain disorders is the 
blood-brain barrier. This safety net that shields our brain from foreign 
substances also prevents needed medications from getting to damaged cells. 
But scientists may have found a way around the problem. When ascorbic acid 
-- better known as vitamin C -- is chemically attached to certain drugs, it 
allows them to penetrate the barrier, reaching more of its target cells 
within the brain.


"We've opened a door for a promising new way to improve delivery of drugs 
into the brain using a natural nutrient, ascorbic acid," says study leader 
Stefano Manfredini, professor of pharmaceutical chemistry at the University 
of Ferrara, Italy.


The findings appear in the Jan. 31 issue of the Journal of Medicinal 
Chemistry.


Manfredini's team has tested the drug-delivery system only on animals and on 
human tissue samples but not on living human beings, so much more 
investigation is needed. But so far, he says, the results are "exciting."


Their work was based on the recent discovery of a receptor, called the SVCT2 
transporter, which seems to play a role in the transportation of vitamin C 
into the brain, where concentrations of the nutrient are normally high. If 
they attached vitamin C to a drug, they reasoned, the transporter would help 
the modified drug cross the barrier.


First, they tested the theory in the laboratory with three drugs for brain 
disorders -- including epilepsy and Alzheimer's -- using tissue samples with 
the same amount of SVCT2 transporters as in the human blood-brain barrier. 
In all three cases, the vitamin C significantly increased the amount of drug 
that interacted with the transporters. This, say the researchers, suggested 
that more drug would cross the blood-brain barrier in a living organism.


Then they tested one of the modified drugs in mice with induced convulsions. 
They injected some of the animals with the normal version of the drug and 
others with the modified version. Only animals that received the drug with 
attached vitamin C had delayed convulsions -- indicating that the drug was 
more effective. None of the mice had serious side effects or died from the 
treatment.


In the report, the researchers add that the findings open new, interesting 
perspectives for the possibility of obtaining modified drugs effective at 
crossing the blood-brain barrier. "Further studies are currently ongoing in 
order to assess and extend this possibility," they write.



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