A chemical derived from broccoli sprouts can be used to manage schizophrenia symptoms, scientists have found, paving the way for treatments that reduces unwanted side effects of traditional medicines.
Scientists from Johns Hopkins University in the US characterised a set of chemical imbalances in the brains of people with schizophrenia related to the chemical glutamate.
Supplementing with broccoli sprout extract, which contains high levels of the chemical sulphoraphane, may someday provide a way to tweak the level of chemical glutamate.
Sulphoraphane is found in a variety of cruciferous vegetables, and was first identified as a “chemoprotective” substance decades ago, researchers said.
Schizophrenia is marked by hallucinations, delusions and disordered thinking, feeling, behaviour, perception and speaking.
Drugs used to treat schizophrenia don’t work completely for everyone, and they can cause a variety of undesirable side effects, including metabolic problems increasing cardiovascular risk, involuntary movements, restlessness, stiffness and “the shakes.”
In a study, published in the journal JAMA Psychiatry, researchers looked for differences in brain metabolism between people with schizophrenia and healthy controls.
They recruited 81 people within 24 months of their first psychosis episode, which can be a characteristic symptom of schizophrenia, as well as 91 healthy controls from the community.
The participants were an average of 22 years old, and 58 per cent were men.
The researchers used a powerful magnet to measure and compare five regions in the brain between the people with and without psychosis.
The researchers found on average four per cent significantly lower levels of the brain chemical glutamate in the anterior cingulate cortex region of the brain in people with psychosis compared to healthy people.
Glutamate is known for its role in sending messages between brain cells, and has been linked to depression and schizophrenia, so these findings added to evidence that glutamate levels have a role in schizophrenia.
Additionally, the researchers found a significant reduction of three per cent of the chemical glutathione in the brain’s anterior cingulate cortex and eight per cent in the thalamus.
Glutathione is made of three smaller molecules, and one of them is glutamate. (PTI)
