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Vitamin C can fight Alzheimer's disease
Last reviewed: 30.06.2025
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Scientists from Lund University (Sweden) have discovered a new function of vitamin C: it is capable of dissolving toxic protein deposits that form in the brain during Alzheimer's disease.
Vitamin C can be absorbed by the body in large amounts in the form of dehydroascorbic acid from juice that has been refrigerated overnight. (Photo the food passionates / Corbis.) Vitamin C can be absorbed by the body in large amounts in the form of dehydroascorbic acid from juice that has been refrigerated overnight. (Photo the food passionates / Corbis.)
The brains of people with Alzheimer's contain so-called amyloid plaques, which are made up of accumulations of prion proteins. These plaques cause nerve cell death, and the first to be affected are always those nerves in the areas of the brain responsible for memory.
When researchers treated brain tissue from mice with Alzheimer's disease with vitamin C, they found that toxic protein deposits dissolved. Another interesting discovery was that ascorbic acid does not necessarily have to come from fresh fruit. Experiments showed that vitamin C can be absorbed in large quantities in the form of dehydroascorbic acid from juice that has been refrigerated overnight.
Antioxidants like vitamin C, which have a protective effect against a variety of diseases (from the common cold to heart attacks and dementia), have been studied for quite some time. It is too early to say that ascorbic acid has a beneficial effect on Alzheimer's disease, but the results of this work open up new perspectives for studying the neurodegenerative disease and the medicinal properties of vitamin C.