[Sdpg] Cinnamon Compounds Help Blood Sugar

[Fred's Notebook]

Hey!  Another vote for cinnamon rolls!

Has anyone grown cinnamon?  I wonder what sort of temperatures and soil 
cinnamon wants?

Fred

STORY LEAD:
Beneficial Compounds in Cinnamon Spice Up Insulin Sensitivity
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ARS News Service
Agricultural Research Service, USDA
Rosalie Marion Bliss, (301) 504-4318, rbliss at ars.usda.gov
April 19, 2004
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Several compounds isolated from cinnamon may one day become the key
natural ingredients in a new generation of products aimed at lowering
blood sugar levels. Agricultural Research Service scientists extracted
the complexes from cinnamon bark.

In test tube assays, the compounds, called polyphenolic polymers,
increased sugar metabolism in fat cells twentyfold. Millions of people
have impaired sugar and fat metabolism, which can lead to Type 2
diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

ARS chemist Richard A. Anderson and colleagues at the Beltsville (Md.)
Human Nutrition Research Center (BHNCR) and two universities conducted
the research. The findings were published this year in the Journal of
Agricultural and Food Chemistry. ARS is the U.S. Department of
Agriculture's chief scientific research agency.

The extracted compounds increase insulin sensitivity by activating key
enzymes that stimulate insulin receptors, while inhibiting enzymes that
deactivate the receptors. The compounds also have antioxidant effects,
which may provide synergistic benefits to people with various forms of
diabetes.

Last year, the researchers reported that less than a half-teaspoon of
cinnamon daily for 40 days reduced by about 20 percent the blood sugar,
cholesterol and triglyceride levels of 60 volunteers in Pakistan with
Type 2 diabetes. But table cinnamon made from cinnamon bark contains
fat-soluble compounds. Those compounds may accumulate in the body if
ingested consistently as more than a spice over long periods of time.

The newly defined, water-soluble compounds can be separated from nearly
all the fat-soluble, potentially toxic components found in cinnamon
bark, according to Anderson. He is with the BHNRC's Nutrient
Requirements and Functions Laboratory in Beltsville.

The USDA has filed a patent application on the invention.

Read more about this research in the April issue of Agricultural
Research magazine, available online at:
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/apr04/cinnam0404.htm
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