Citicoline/Cognizin information & alphabetized links to Sacramento nutrition examiner's articles

Would you like to know how to increase your key neurotransmitters? Here's the latest information from Healthy Origins® and Kyowa Hakko (Kyowa USA). Citicoline stabilizes the membranes of your brain.

Citicoline/Cognizin: Does it Improve Your Brain?

According to studies, citicoline, also known by its brand name, Cognizin®, supposedly works in three ways: 1. to improve the means by which phospholipids are synthesized in your brain and in the rest of your body, 2. to increase key neurotransmitters, and 3. to exert a positive effect on your mitrochondria. The goal is to provide more energy. You're energizing your brain with citicoline (brand name, Cognizin).

Citicoline, also known by its brand name of Cognizin, from Kyowa Hakko USA, is a precursor of phosphatidylcholine, a type of phospholipid that is a component of cell membranes, according to information on it from Healthy Origins®. Scientists are researching the nutritional supplement. And in the meantime, it is believed that citicoline stabilizes the membranes. When absorbed by your body, citicoline breaks down into cytidine and choline.

Then the citicoline reforms in the body as it is converted to acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter vital for communication between neurons, according to the information from Healthy Origins®. But CDP Choline (Citicoline) is already found naturally in your body. So the nutritional supplement called Cognizin® has been shown in clinical trial studies to be "a pure, nutritional ingredient used in numerous nutritional and clinical studies."

Speaking of a natural approach to restoring energy to your brain, and sharpening your ability to stay alert and focused, you might look at the Harvard study presented at the Society for Neuroscience's recent conference in San Diego. The study suggested that Citicoline "may provide the brain with the important chemical fuel needed to help you focus, be more productive, and experience less anxiety."

The study looked at the effect of Citicoline or CDP-Choline (brand name Cogizin) on the brain's energy sources, according to the senior investigator of the study, Perry Renshaw M.D., PhD, Director of the Brain Imaging Center at McLean Hostpital and Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School. "As we age, the brain's efficiency diminishes. Caffeine affects the whole brain, but Cognizin delivers nutrients to only the regions of the brain that sustain your ability to pay attention, make good decisions, and provide a sense of direction enabling you to get work done."

The six week study followed 16 healthy men and women, who self-administered either 500 mg. or 2,000 mg. of Cognizin Citicoline. At the end of the trial period, all subjects experienced significant increases in the brain's energy sources regardless of dose. For more information, see the abstract: NMR Biomed. (2008) DOI. 10.1002/nbm. In the abstract, Citicoline supplementation has been used to ameliorate memory disturbances in older people and those with Alzheimer's disease."

"The study used MRS to characterize the effects of citicoline on high-energy phosphate metabolites and constituents of membrane synthesis in the frontal lobe." According to the abstract, "This study concludes that significant neurometabolic and neurophysiological alterations, i.e. improved frontal lobe bioenergetics and phospholipids membrane turnover, are observed in healhty adults who received citicoline supplmentation for six weeks.

Furthermore, citicoline-related alternations in the brain neurochemistry were regionally specific, targeting a frontal brain region (ACC) implicated in a variety of cognitive functions, including attention and memory." For more information on citicoline or "Cognizin/Citicoline", check out the Healthy Origins site or the Kyowa USA site.

Here is a list below of some of my other articles on nutrition and health. Usually, at least one new article is added daily. Check the archives at my home page for additional articles.

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