In a new study, researchers found a compound in pickled capers could activate proteins required for normal brain and heart activity, and may even lead to future therapies for epilepsy and abnormal heart rhythms.
They discovered that a compound named quercetin, commonly consumed when eating capers, can directly regulate proteins required for bodily processes such as the heartbeat, thought, muscular contraction, and normal functioning of the thyroid, pancreas and gastrointestinal tract.
The research was conducted by a team from the University of California, Irvine.
The team found that quercetin, a plant-derived bioflavonoid, modulates potassium ion channels in the KCNQ gene family.
They screened plant extracts for the ability to alter the activity of KCNQ channels and found that 1% extract of pickled capers activated channels important for the normal human brain and heart activity.
These channels are highly influential in human health and their dysfunction is linked to several common human diseases, including diabetes, cardiac arrhythmia, and epilepsy.
The study showed that quercetin modulates the KCNQ channels by directly regulating how they sense electrical activity in the cell, suggesting a previously unexpected mechanism for the therapeutic properties of capers.
The mechanism may extend to other quercetin-rich foods in our diet and quercetin-based nutritional supplements.
The team says future medicinal chemistry studies can be pursued to create and optimize quercetin-related small molecules for potential use as therapeutic drugs.
Increasing the activity of KCNQ channels in different parts of the body is potentially highly beneficial.
Synthetic drugs that do this have been used to treat epilepsy and show promise in preventing abnormal heart rhythms.
Archaeological evidence for human caper consumption dates back as far as 10,000 years, according to archaeological findings from Mesolithic soil deposits in Syria and late Stone Age cave dwellings in the Greece and Israel.
Capers have traditionally been used as a folk medicine for hundreds if not thousands of years and are in current use or study for their potential as anti-cancer, anti-diabetic and anti-inflammatory properties, and their possible circulatory and gastrointestinal benefits.
One author of the study is Geoffrey Abbott, Ph.D., a professor in the Department of Physiology and Biophysics.
The study is published in Communications Biology.
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