Blonde Angel
Stalwart
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My sincere thanks to Dr Paolo Mainardi for his wonderful contributions. Research involves tremendous effort and submissions do have criteria for approval.
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He also claims:...Today, we know that ketones are not responsible for anticonvulsant action [4].
This has been known for a while now thanks to research on other alternative diets like the MAD and LGIT:
http://www.coping-with-epilepsy.com/index.php?p=modified-atkins-diet
IIRC, we also discussed this a bit with Dr. Mainardi in the Tryptophan thread.
There's also interaction between good bacteria such as Lactobacillus and tryptophan which affects immune response to control fungi.
"While poorly understood, these 'disappearing' lesions may in fact be the consequence of seizures, rather than the cause."
The tryptophan/serotonin issue is a complex one in terms of how the body needs a certain form of tryptophan for the brain to be able to properly utilize it, and from there the brain breaks down or processes this form into the different chemical components in a step-wise fashion until it gets to the synaptic cleft where it is then released and the neuron fires. If researchers can figure out at what "level" this tryptophan processing goes awry (ie. not enough is produced) to cause a particular disorder, then supplements of that particular form of tryptophan can be made and used. Just going to the health food store and getting tryptophan in the hopes of treating some disorder is a shot in the dark unless you know exactly what form the tryptophan is and what form of tryptophan is needed for a particular disorder (assuming, of course, that there is significant evidence that any form of tryptophan can even work for that disorder).
Case in point: tryptophan has been shown to help with certain forms of dystonia. Not just any form, but the 5-HTP (5-hydroxytryptophan) type because it is the 5-HTP level of tryptophan processing in the brain that for some reason not enough is being made from the next higher up level of tryptophan processing. So, supplements of 5-HTP give a "boost" to that processing level in the brain to enable more normal firing of the neurons involved in motor control.
The other issue: I take medicinal grade 5-HTP that is specially formulated to ensure it crosses the blood-brain barrier and gets to where it is needed. Not to mention that the amount of 5-HTP is carefully controlled. None of this is the case with herbal supplements of 5-HTP or any other form of tryptophan. So far this medicinal grade 5-HTP is only available to research physicians such as geneticists and biochemical disease specialists unfortunately, at least in Canada.
Aromatic l‐amino acid decarboxylase (AADC; dopa decarboxylase; E.C. 4.1.1.28 ) is a PLP‐dependent enzyme that catalyses the production of dopamine and serotonin from l‐3, 4‐dihydroxyphenylalanine (l‐dopa) and l‐5‐hydroxytryptophan (5‐HTP), respectively.