Major news about one of my favorite molecules, l-fucose. In addition to being part of the antigenic structure of the H antigen found in blood group O, fucose is now garnering attention as an important component in learning. Although neurophysiology spends quite a bit of time looking at the neurosynaptic junction (the gap between two nerve cells, where nerve conduction occurs) most of the emphasis is on the neurotransmitters (such as serotonin and dopamine) that can jump the gap.

However, what goes into holding the synapse together may be as important a factor in cognition and learning as what jumps across the synapse. And that appears to be lectin-like receptors on one side of the nerve synapse which bind to fucose as a ligand on the other.

In other words your nerves have a sweet tooth for fucose.

What stands between you and your next thought.

Reaction in the brain involving fucose skyrocket during periods of intense learning. And human milk is a very rich source of the sugar, with amounts far higher than all other species. The sugar content of human milk varies by ABO blood type and secretor status which makes me want to do a study looking at learning differences along blood group and secretor status in breast fed and bottle fed children.

The fucosyltransferase enzymes FUT1, FUT2 and FUT3 are very intimately involved in determining ABO, secretor and Lewis blood types and recent research has linked serum B12 levels (another important player in proper nerve function) to the FUT2 (secretor) gene.

Fucose and fucosylation have a big role in ontogeny (the origin and the development of an organism from the fertilized egg to its mature form) via it's role in the development of the Lewis X antigen (FUT9) which supports cell-to-cell-adhesion in embryos. Lewis X expression in the brain is in turn controlled by the PAX6 gene, which regulates many elements of nerve growth in addition to forming the architecture of the iris.

The link between PAX6 and Lewis X (FUT9) may explain why a recent study showed that at least some aspects of personality were determined by the genetics of iris formation. Close-up pictures were taken of the study participants' irises, and they also filled out a questionnaire about their personalities. The researchers looked at crypts (pits) and contraction furrows (lines curving around the outer edge of the iris), which are formed when pupils dilate. It was found that those with more crypts were likely to be tender, warm and trusting, while those with more furrows were more likely to be neurotic, impulsive and give in to cravings.

PAX6 is gene that helps regulate embryonic differentiation. PAX6 also has some interesting effects on adrenal and pancreatic function as well as norepinephrine expression in the gut via the enteric nervous system. Maybe there's a future in medicine for the iris after all.

Going forward, I predict that soon the best thing to use in kids who are learning-challenged will not be the usual suspects like Ritalin or SSRIs, but rather glycomic agents from the diet that enhance fucosylation. These drugs do enhance the function or persistence of neurotransmitters, but fucosylation enhancers seem to enhance the stability of the entire neural network. It makes no sense to up-regulate neurotransmitters if you haven't insured that the nerves are holding to each other in the first place.

Of course, most of the old blood typers know that Bladderwrack (Fucus vesiculosis) is a decent source of fucose.

Schizophrenia, gluten, and low-carbohydrate, ketogenic diets

We report the unexpected resolution of longstanding schizophrenic symptoms after starting a low-carbohydrate, ketogenic diet. After a review of the literature, possible reasons for this include the metabolic consequences from the elimination of gluten from the diet, and the modulation of the disease of schizophrenia at the cellular level.

Article Link
Comment:

Previously, Dohan (Acta Psych Scand 1966, 42(2):125-152) observed a decrease in hospital admissions for schizophrenia in countries that had limited bread consumption during World War II, which suggested a possible relationship between bread and schizophrenia. Early work with lectins clearly showed that the brains of schizophrenics bind lectins differently than the brain tissue of non-schizophrenics, which appears to make sense in that the carbohydrate content of schizophrenic brain tissue (in addition to dementia and a few other illnesses) revealed the existence of spherical deposits in the inner and middle molecular layers of the dentate gyrus in the hippocampal formation which contained fucose, galactose, N-acetyl galactosamine, N-acetyl glucosamine, sialic acid, mannose and chondroitin sulfate; many of these blood group active carbohydrates with known lectin binding affinities (link).

Over the years some of the most stirring letters I've received from book readers have centered around improvements in family members with schizophrenia. Almost all of these letters have been from or about blood type O schizophrenics, which may mean that the nutritional approach to schizophrenia might necessarily differ by foods and blood type. We are now only beginning to understand the effects of tissue glycosylation on the development and maintenance of brain neural networks.

QUESTION: I am a type A and have been trying to incorporate more of the recommended grains. I purchased amaranth and cooked as described however, it turned into a slimy goo. Is this the way it is supposed to be?

ANSWER: Amaranth is a broad-leafed plant which produces multi-headed flowerets containing grain-like seed of extremely high nutritional value. The tiny seeds are a creamy tan in color and are about 1/32" in diameter. Each plant produces 40,000-60,000 seeds. The amaranth seeds are used in their whole grain form, milled into flour or puffed into miniature kernels.

For centuries, the Aztecs and American Indians have known the benefits and diverse uses for amaranth.

Not only is amaranth higher in protein than most commonly used grains, that protein, containing high levels of lysine and methionine, is better balanced and more complete. Amaranth, with 13-19% protein, scores closer to a perfect 100 on a theoretical protein score chart than do other grains. For example, amaranth's 75 is significantly higher than wheat at 56.9, corn at 44, soybeans at 68 or even cow's milk at 72.5.

Amaranth possesses a potent lectin that has been shown to identify colon cancer cells which are in the early stages of mutation.(1) As such a diet high in amaranth may well be protective against this common cancer, which is known to have a significantly higher incidence in blood group A.

Here's a great recipe that uses amaranth flour to make a grain free bread:



Grain-Free Boston Brown Bread

Yield: 1 loaf

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons amaranth flour 1/4 cup arrowroot 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon powdered ginger 1/2 cup currants 1/2 cup walnuts 3/4 cup boiling unsweetened fruit juice or water 1/4 cup honey or molasses 1 tablespoon lemon juice.

Generously oil a 1-quart mold or 1 pound coffee can. Fill a Dutch oven or stockpot with about 5 inches of water. Bring the water to a boil while you prepare the batter.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, arrowroot, baking soda and ginger. Stir in the currants.

In a blender, grind the walnuts to a fine powder. Add the juice or water, and blend 20 seconds. If the ingredients in the blender don't reach the 1 -cup mark, add a little more liquid. With the blender running on low, add the honey or molasses and lemon juice.

Pour the liquid mixture into the flour bowl. Stir quickly to blend; do not overmix. Transfer to the prepared mold orcan. Cover with a square of foil or wax paper; tie the wax paper securely with a piece of string.

Place the mold in the boiling water. (It should come halfway up the sides.) Cover the pot tightly, and steam for 2 hours over medium-low heat. Do not remove the cover during that time.

Remove the mold from the pot. Cool the bread in the mold for 15 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely. For the best results, cut with a serated knife with a gentle sawing motion.

Variations: Replace the honey or molasses with 1/3 cup maple syrup. Instead of the currants, use dried unsweetened pineapple, apples, prunes or ther dried fruit; use the corresponding juice as the liquid.



(1)Boland CR, Chen YF, Rinderle SJ, Resau JH, Luk GD, Lynch HT. Use of the lectin from Amaranthus caudatus as a histochemical probe of proliferating colonic epithelial cells. Cancer Res. 1991 Jan 15;51(2):657-65.

I've spent the beginning of this New Year cleaning up the various sites that I administer. In finishing up work on the genomic wiki-like knowledge base that we built several years ago, I thought it might be helpful to suggest 25 of what I feel are the best articles on The Individualist.

These are not exactly 'consumer level' stuff; more likely it would be called 'pro-sumer level' and I recommend these articles for those die-hards who just have to know everything. If you are still trying to figure out what to do with spelt, tofu or agave syrup, you may want to wait a while before tackling them.

1. ABH Antigens
2. A-like Tumor Antigens
3. ABO Blood Group
4. ABO and Secretor Genetics
5. Agglutination
6. Blood and Anthropology
7. Biology of Carbohydrates
8. Chromosome 9q34
9. Disease and Blood Groups
10. Epigenetics
11. Founder Effect
12. Genes and Environment
13. Glycation
14. Glycolipids
15. Glycoproteins
16. Joseph Charles Aub
17. Lamarckism Revisited
18. Lectins
19. Lectins Resist Digestion
20. Lectins and the Intestines
21. DNA Methylation
22. Phenotypic Plasticity
23. Polyamines
24. Secretor Status
25. Stress Blood Groups

In continuing my work on developing The Individualist Wiki, again and again I come up against the greatness of one single man: William Clouser Boyd.

William C. Boyd.

• Boyd wrote the first textbook of immunology.
• Boyd discovered the blood type specificity of many lectins.
• Boyd coined the word 'lectin.'
• He was one of the first 'paleoserologists', using lectins to trace the blood type distributions of many populations around the world. Boyd was the first to document that blood group substances could be recovered intact from physical remains of graves, such as from mummies.
• With Isaac Asimov, he wrote a book for the general public which was one of the first to attack the notion that race was a scientific fact.
• He developed antibody techniques, such as precipitation and flocculation, and applied them to blood group serology.
• He was among the first researchers to recommend the use of magnesium salts in the immediate aftermath of heart attack.
• Boyd wrote some pretty good science fiction (under the name "Boyd Ellanby" ).

Every time I venture into something, be it ABO blood group immunology, lectins in foods, anthropology, and a slew of immunology techniques, this guy was there first. It's a pity nobody really knows about him.

Best serologist, ever.

Here it is.. another Monday and another research grab-bag.

Five daily portions of fruits and vegetables raise serum antioxidants in three months

To explore the effects of increasing fruit and vegetable intake and the resulting effects on levels of circulating micronutrients in a community-dwelling population with an already high consumption of fruits and vegetables, 112 volunteers (86% women) underwent targeted dietary counseling for three months. At the beginning of the study and after 4, 8 and 12 weeks a food frequency questionnaire was filled in, and plasma levels of dietary antioxidants as well as biomarkers of oxidative lipid and protein damage were determined. Compared to baseline, especially the intake of fruits was significantly improved after 3 months of intervention, and mean plasma levels of lutein, zeaxanthin, β-cryptoxanthin, lycopene, α- and β-carotene, retinol, α-tocopherol, vitamin C and vitamin B6 were increased. Biomarkers of oxidative stress remained unchanged. Thus, a nutritional counseling program is capable of improving plasma levels of antioxidants even in a health-conscious population.

Article Link
Comment:

What is especially interesting about this study was that they used individuals who were already eating a pretty healthy diet, which just goes to show that even if you follow the BTD or GTD in terms of food choices, something as basic as making sure that you get the required amounts of recommended fruits and vegetables can make a big difference.

Schizophrenia, gluten, and low-carbohydrate, ketogenic diets

We report the unexpected resolution of longstanding schizophrenic symptoms after starting a low-carbohydrate, ketogenic diet. After a review of the literature, possible reasons for this include the metabolic consequences from the elimination of gluten from the diet, and the modulation of the disease of schizophrenia at the cellular level.

Article Link
Comment:

Previously, Dohan (Acta Psych Scand 1966, 42(2):125-152) observed a decrease in hospital admissions for schizophrenia in countries that had limited bread consumption during World War II, which suggested a possible relationship between bread and schizophrenia. Early work with lectins clearly showed that the brains of schizophrenics bind lectins differently than the brain tissue of non-schizoprhenics, which appears to make sense in that the carbohydrate content of schizophrenic brain tissue (in addition to dementia and a few other illnesses) revealed the existence of spherical deposits in the inner and middle molecular layers of the dentate gyrus in the hippocampal formation which contained fucose, galactose, N-acetyl galactosamine, N-acetyl glucosamine, sialic acid, mannose and chondroitin sulfate; many of these blood group active carbohydrates with known lectin binding affinities (link).

Over the years some of the most stirring letters I've received from book readers have centered around improvements in family members with schizophrenia. Almost all of these letters have been from or about blood type O schizophrenics, which may mean that the nutritional approach to schizophrenia might necessarily differ by foods and blood type. We are now only beginning to understand the effects of tissue glycosylation on the development and maintenance of brain neural networks (in particular those utilizing the blood group O specific antigen fucose).

Lectin-epithelial interactions in the human colon.

Similar changes in glycosylation occur in the colonic epithelium in inflammatory conditions such as ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease and also in colon cancer and precancerous adenomatous polyps...Tools are now available to allow fast and accurate elucidation of glycosylation changes in epithelial disease, characterization of their potential lectin ligands, whether dietary, microbial or human, and determination of the functional significance of their interactions. This should prove a very fruitful area for future research with relevance to infectious, inflammatory and cancerous diseases of the epithelia.

Article Link
Comment:

In years past I've written about the effects of some dietary lectins on the cells of the colon, in particular the lectins found in mushrooms, fava beans and jackfruit. Most of the plant lectins are specific for the Thomsen-Friedenreich Antigen (T antigen) a pseudo blood group antigen which is often expressed in pre-malignant cells of the colon.

Here is a quote from a study examining fava (broad) bean lectin:

VFA stimulated an undifferentiated colon cancer cell line to differentiate into gland like structures. The adhesion molecule epCAM is involved in this. Dietary or therapeutic VFA may slow progression of colon cancer.

(link)

Here is a quote from a study examining standard commercial supermarket mushroom lectin:

Agaricus bisporus agglutinin (ABA) isolated from edible mushroom has a potent anti-proliferative effect on malignant colon cells with considerable therapeutic potential as an anti-neoplastic agent.

(link)

Here is a quote from a study examining jackfruit lectin:

(Jacalin) Lectin binding to human colonocytes can predict the presence of malignant and premalignant lesions of the colon, and has potential as a noninvasive screening tool for colorectal neoplasms.

(link)

If you have a family history of colon cancer, or have been diagnosed with colon abnormalities (such as polyps) you may want to investigate adding more of these foods to you diet (using the BTD as a guide to which would be best for you)

Human pseudogenes of the ABO family show a complex evolutionary dynamics and loss of function.

The GT6 glycosyltransferases gene family, that includes the AB0 blood group, shows a complex evolution pattern, with multiple events of gain and loss in different mammal species.These results suggest that some of these GT6 human pseudogenes may still be functional and retain some valuable unknown function in humans, in some case even at the protein level. The evolutionary analysis of all members of the GT6 family in humans allows an insight in their functional history, a process likely due to the interaction of the host glycans that they synthesize with pathogens; the past process that can be unravelled through the footprints left by natural selection in the extant genome variation.

Article Link
Comment:

Pseudogenes have been defined as nonfunctional sequences of genomic DNA originally derived from functional genes and are sometimes referred to as 'Junk DNA.' However new finding are suggestive that these areas of non-coding DNA and RNA may be involved in developmental changes which differentiate the functions linked to the blood type genes that occur between the various species.

Another nail in the coffin for the 'animals have blood types and don't eat right for their type' criticism of the Blood Type Diet by the nincompoop Andrew Weil.

The Effect of ABO Blood Types on Periodontal Status.

A relatively higher percentage of A group patients was found in gingivitis group and relatively higher percentage of O group patients was found in periodontitis group. A significant relationship was also determined between Rh factor and gingivitis. ABO blood subgroups and Rh factor may constitute a risk factor on the development of periodontal disease. However, long-term studies are needed to make a more comprehensive assessment of the effects of ABO group on periodontal diseases.

Article Link
Comment:

I'm sure that secretor status had something to do with these results, since it has an effect on pellicle formation (link) I do however, agree with the results. In my own patients I have seen periodontal disease resolve easily in many type A's by simply getting their gingivitis under control. Type O's on the other hand have a harder time of things, especially if their protein intake is not adequate.

That's about it for this week.

A bit of news: I would be willing to entertain questions about topics that might be of interest to this community. Just drop a comment (link is below). I will not however, respond to questions of a personal medical nature, nor give medical advice. Thanks for respecting this caveat.