I prefer sugar. I steer away from HFCS. I have been reading about the resurgence of the sweetener. Here is a story I read at school http://www.themarketingscene.com/index.php...ic/hi_fructose/

Any thoughts?

Hi Suzco,
Research is turning up some very interesting things about fructose, like using it in excess makes it the number one enemy of the brain, and according to Dr Mc Cleary ( and I have seen no reason to doubt what he says), it causes very severe brain shrinkage.Listen to the podcast and see what you think.

http://www.healthcastle.com/podcast-018.shtml

Cheers

Actually Partially Hydrogenated Oils are worse for the brain and should avoided at all costs. This is because your brains protective layer, the myelin sheath is made up of mostly lipids, or fats. The particular fat is DHA, an omega 3 fatty acid.

The bad thing is when hydrogenated oils, including fried foods, are ingested, these types of fat actually become apart of the myelin sheath. Basically what ever type of fat you consume, is forced to be apart of the lipid barrier around your brain neurons. Which is a very bad thing!

Research is showing this may be a reason neurodegenerative diseases such as Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinson's disease, and Alzheimer's disease.

As far as fructose syrup and brain shrinkage.... I think what the doctor means by brain shrinkage is that it causes you to become "dumb" or lose learning/memory capability. We would all be walking around with a hollow head if that was the case.

Research with rats have shown that eight months on a high fructose syrup diet impeded spatial learning ability, lowered the density of brain cells, and the function of brain synapses.... affecting learning ability.

I hope this was insightful, I'll try to find the research link sometime.

Thanks,
J.R. - Registered Dietitian

Hi Josh83,
After reading your post I thought you probably was right so I rechecked Dr McLeary's podcast and what he clearly said was " On sophisticated brain scans you can actually see the brain shrinkage, that is the loss of brain cells over time, and fructose was actually worse for the brain than smoking or blood pressure, fructose was the best cause of brain shrinkage".

Shrinkage of brain volume does happen according to my understanding of what I read, and it can be caused by B12 deficiency, alcoholism etc ( I couldn't find any links to shrinkage and trans fats (partially hodrogenated veg oils)), exercise offers some protection from shrinkage and in fact may increase the size of your brain.

Cheers

Does anybody know if there are similar effects with Xylitol or other non-sugar sweeteners?

Hi Never2lateforpizza,
Xylitol causes flatulence and protects against tooth decay but I haven't seen anything on brain shrinkage.

Cheers