wine and health

An article just out this week suggests that resveratrol actually cancels the beneficial effects of exercise in older men. This widely cited study, not yet even in print, was a randomized prospective clinical trial in which healthy but inactive men were placed on an exercise program and given either a 250 mg resveratrol supplement or placebo.   Exercise tolerance (measured by maximum oxygen uptake), improved cholesterol profiles, and blood pressure indicators in a group of men average age 65 were all improved after 6 weeks in the placebo group as compared to those taking resveratrol , who had no significant changes.   This runs counter to expectations from several previous studies (mostly on mice) that suggested the opposite. Resveratrol has even been touted as a performance-enhancing supplement! This is one reason why use of supplements based primarily on animal studies is problematic; when tested in humans, data may be contradictory. The real questions are how and why...

When I first developed our resveratrol-based antioxidant skin care product Veraderma in conjunction with Calidora Skin Clinics in 2008, I had good reason to believe in its potent anti-aging capabilities. Resveratrol , the multipurpose miracle molecule whose most familiar source is wine grape skins (hence red wine because it is fermented with the skins), has become a bit of a sensation since then. Several major skin care companies now include wine compounds in their products, and the science continues to reinforce the role of resveratrol in healthy skin (even if its use as an oral supplement remains to be proven.) One example comes from independent research underwritten by L’Oreal, which found that there are specific resveratrol “binding sites” in human skin cells that mediate resveratrol’s protective properties. These binding sites appear to trigger changes within the cells rendering them resistant to damage from environmental toxins. Notably, resveratrol was more effective t...