PLT Test Blog

One medical researcher, who reads this blog, sent me a recent article about the vast amount of research that has been carried out on curcumin, which is widely used as a supplement. Many apparently interesting natural substances suffer from low bioavailability and the arguments put forward in the paper do apply to many other supplements.   On the other hand, there are natural substances that do have useful medical properties in humans; it is just very hard to identify which ones, without making your own research.   Chemists warn against deceptive molecules Inside the golden-yellow spice turmeric lurks a chemical deceiver: curcumin, a molecule that is widely touted as having medicinal activity, but which also gives false signals in drug screening tests. For years, chemists have urged caution about curcumin and other compounds that can mislead naive drug hunters.   Now, in an attempt to stem a continuing flow of muddled research, scientists have published the most comprehens...

Pu-erh, a fermented tea from Yunnan province, China.   An mGluR5 inhibitor to remedy basal ganglia circuit abnormalities? PANDAS / PANS ( Pediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disorders Associated with Streptococcal infections/ Pediatric Acute-onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome) are recognized disorders in North America, but nowhere else.   If you take your child to Boston Children’s Hospital and ask about PANDAS they will know what you are talking about, try this at a children’s hospital in Europe and you will be directed to the local zoo. For those new to the subject PANDAS / PANS cause sudden onset of tics and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) accompanied by sudden cognitive regression. I have written about PANDAS/PANS in previous posts. PANDAS, PANS, Penguins and Autism I was surprised how well documented these syndromes are and that they are treated by some mainstream physicians. The leading researcher in the field, Susan Swedo, makes a point that PANDAS/PANS is not aut...

Add testosterone/estradiol to those dysfunctional hormones This blog is about noticing connections and making things a little simpler to understand.   Today’s post is going to be a good example; all those odd sounding things like Purkinje cells and neuroligins all fitting nicely together. Today we see how a central hormonal dysfunction (testosterone/estradiol) can lead to an ion channel dysfunction (NKCC1/KCC2) at one end of the chain and at the other explains the absence of many Purkinje cells in the autistic cerebellum, which leads to some of the observed features of autism. I am calling it the Purkinje-RORa-Estradiol-Neuroligin-KCC2 axis, or Purkinje-KCC2 axis for short. We also get to see how melatonin fits in here and see why disturbed sleeping patterns should be expected in someone affected by the Purkinje- KCC2 axis. I should point out that not everyone with autism is likely affected by the Purkinje-NKCC1 axis, but I think it will apply to a majority of those with non-regre...