Cucumber and Bioactive Compound Cucurbitacins, The Best Neuroprotective Agents

The central nervous system containing the brain and the spinal cord is the complex system of nerve tissues that controls the activities of the human body.

It is the center that controls our thoughts, the interpreter of our external environment, and the body movement.

Neuroprotection is an action, including the use of substances such as herbal medicines to protect our bain against the loss and death of neurons.


Believe it or not, diseases associated with CNS are including
* Brain and spinal cord trauma, a type of condition can lead paralysis to mood disorders, depending on the location of the injury.


*CNS Infections caused by micro-organisms and viruses can lead as is meningitis and malaria.\

*Disease associated with neuro-degeneration, include Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease.

* Diseases associated with birth defects include anencephaly.
* Brain tumors caused by abnormal cell growth in the brain or metastases by primary cancer from other tissues and organ.* Autoimmune disorders caused by the immune system that attacks mistakenly the brain and spinal cord cells.

* Stroke caused the death of neurons due to the reduced blood supply to the brain.

However, out of many risk factors involved in the onset of neurodegenerative disease, some researchers suggested that the promotion of a high-fat diet may be the major culprit that causes the rise of the incidence in the Western world.

Dr. the lead scientist wrote, "This increase in glial responses was associated with increased plaque burden in the hippocampus. Interestingly, given recent studies highlighting the importance of TREM2 in microglia/monocytes in AD susceptibility and progression, B6 and APP/PS1 mice fed the western diet showed significant increases TREM2+ microglia/monocytes".

And, " Therefore, an increase in TREM2+ microglia/monocytes may underlie the increased risk from a western diet to age-related neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease".

On finding a potential ingredient that processes neuroprotective effect researchers evaluated the protective effect of Cucumis melo var. flexuosus (C. Melo var. flexuosus) leaf extract on the brains of diabetic rats.

The study included dietetic male albino rats induced by a single intraperitoneal injection of streptozotocin (STZ; 60 mg/kg bw).divided into 5 groups of 6 rats each, a normal control group and four diabetic groups.

Additionally, 3/4 other groups were treated with C. Melo var. flexuosus (cucumber) leaf extract at the doses of 30, 60 and 120 mg/kg bw for a period of 30 days compared to nontreatment of a diabetic group.

Compared to non treated diabetic rats, treated rat protected the brain neurons by markedly increasing the plasma dopamine, melatonin, brain vascular endothelial growth factor-A levels, particularly the antioxidant activity in the brain tissues.

In other words, cucumber leaf extract processes a neuroprotective effect by preventing neuron oxidative damage associated with diabetes.

Based on the results, Dr. Ibrahim DS, at the Benha University wrote, " it can be concluded that the C. Melo var. flexuosus leaf extract exerts a neuroprotective effect against oxidative damage associated with diabetes".

In order to reveal more information about cucumber neuroprotective property, researchers examined the effect of Cucurbitacins (CuB), a major bioactive compound from cucumber on neuroinflammatory responses are involved in the neuronal injury.

According to the tested results, pretreatment with Cucurbitacins significantly reduced the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines (TNF-α, IL-1β, and IL-6 iNOS and COX-2 expression) in microglia, a type of neuroglia (glial cell) located throughout the brain and spinal cord.

Furthermore, CuB also inhibited the proteins and pathways associated with the stimulation of immune response in the activated production of inflammation.

Moreover, the neuroprotective of CuB was also attributed to the bioactive compound in the activation of (Nrf2/ARE pathway) pathways involved in significantly greater resistance to oxidative stress and protein associated with the production of antioxidants and anti-inflammatory cytokines.


Dr. Park SY, the lead scientist said, "Cucurbitacins is a potent activator of the Nrf2/ARE pathway and is therapeutically relevant not only to neuroinflammatory responses of microglia but also neuroinflammation mediated neuronal injury".

Taken altogether, cucumber processed high levels of CuB may be considered a neuroprotective remedy, pending to the confirmation of the larger sample size and multicenter human study.

Intake of CuB in the form of supplements should be taken with extreme care to prevent overdose acute liver toxicity.

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Author Biography
Kyle J. Norton (Scholar, Master of Nutrition, All right reserved)
Health article writer and researcher; Over 10.000 articles and research papers have been written and published online, including worldwide health, ezine articles, article base, health blogs, self-growth, best before it's news, the karate GB daily, etc.,.
Named TOP 50 MEDICAL ESSAYS FOR ARTISTS & AUTHORS TO READ by Disilgold.com Named 50 of the best health Tweeters Canada - Huffington Post
Nominated for shorty award over last 4 years
Some articles have been used as references in medical research, such as international journal Pharma and Bioscience, ISSN 0975-6299.

(1) Neuroprotective effect of Cucumis melo Var. flexuosus leaf extract on the brains of rats with streptozotocin-induced diabetes by Ibrahim DS. (PubMed)
(2) Cucurbitacins attenuate microglial activation and protect from neuroinflammatory injury through Nrf2/ARE activation and STAT/NF-κB inhibition by Park SY1, Kim YH1, Park G2. (PubMed)
(3) Chronic consumption of a western diet induces robust glial activation in aging mice and in a mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease by Leah C. Graham,1,2 Jeffrey M. Harder,1 Ileana Soto,1 Wilhelmine N. de Vries,1,3Simon W. M. John,1,2,3,4 and Gareth R. Howella. (PMC)