Posted by Larry Hoover on December 16, 2003, at 10:18:42
In reply to Catechins question -- attn chemists!, posted by psychlover on December 16, 2003, at 0:51:38
> Hi folks,
>
> I have been researching green tea lately. It looks like a wonder drug!You will calm down over time.... I suggest you drink some green tea. ;-)
> One statement that confused me though was this one from the PDRhealth.com website (which by the way looks like a great resource for information on supplements):
>
> "Green tea catechins may inhibit catechol-O-methyl-transferase, an enzyme that metabolizes norepinephrine."Considering that monoamine oxidase also degrades norepinephrine, this may not be a significant finding at all.
> Question: Does this mean that drinking significant amounts of green tea will inhibit metabolization of NE? What does that mean?
>
> Thanks for your help,
> psychlover (:-DCOMT is everywhere in your body. It's in the membranes of your intestine, so some of the catechins are methylated before they get into the blood. The blood that carries stuff away from the intestines goes through the liver first (via the portal vein). There is a ton of COMT activity in the liver. And so on....I doubt a whole lot of the catechins get to the brain in their unmetabolized form....but even if they do, I doubt the effect is profound. Given that there are so many other substances in tea, I wouldn't worry too much about one paricular class of compound.
BTW, the metabolism of catechins consumes SAMe.
Lar
poster:Larry Hoover
thread:290366
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/alter/20031204/msgs/290490.html