Dr Gabriel UguruCertain gene mutations confer risk for Alzheimer’s disease as well as some environmental conditions, lifestyle, and dietary habits. Several studies have shown that some metals, copper, iron, and zinc have toxic effects, which promote amyloid aggregation amongst other harmful effects on Alzheimer’s. Amyloid aggregation results from proteins or peptides misfolding and clumping together, a process that can cause diseases, including Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and Type II diabetes.
The prefrontal cortex of the brain found behind the forehead plays a crucial role in executive functions and is an area most affected by Alzheimer’s while the cerebellum is rarely affected at the early stages of Alzheimer’s except in severe cases. Therefore, to determine the effects of metal ion equilibrium in Alzheimer’s, Yankner and coworkers as reported in the August 2025 issue of the journal, Nature, screened a panel of 27 metals in the blood and postmortem brain tissues of aged people with Alzheimer’s and mild cognitive impairment (a condition that in many cases precedes Alzheimer’s). People with no cognitive impairment were included in the screening as controls.
Join our WhatsApp ChannelLithium was the only metal found to be reduced in the prefrontal cortex in people with mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer’s, respectively, but lithium was not reduced in the cerebellum. This reduction was caused by amyloid deposits tying up the lithium thus, making it unavailable for essential brain functions. The workers then studied the relationship between lithium and Alzheimer’s in a mouse model by using mice genetically engineered to develop plaques and Alzheimer’s-like symptoms.
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The workers formulated a chemically based diet that is similar to normal grain diet fed to mice. This diet contained the same level of lithium as in the grain diet. As a control, the same chemically based diet was formulated but without a lithium supplement. One set of mice with Alzheimer’s-like symptoms (AD-mice) and ageing mice were fed with the formulated diet with lithium and another set without lithium. It was found that lithium deficiency increases amyloid deposit formation in both AD-mice and in ageing mice. Also, learning, and long-term memory were impaired in mice fed with lithium deficient diet, but mice fed with lithium-rich diet were protected against memory loss in both the AD-mice and the ageing mice.
Synapse is the junction between two nerve cells that enables communication between the neurones. The workers were able to demonstrate that lithium has a beneficial effect on synapse maintenance in ageing mouse brain. Such result is not surprising because lithium effect on synaptic activity serves as a mood stabiliser in psychiatry for the treatment of bipolar disorder.
To assess which charged lithium salt is better at conducting electrical current in the brain without binding to amyloid plaques, 16 lithium salts were tested. Lithium carbonate, an inorganic salt showed the highest conductance while lithium orotate, an organic salt, had the poorest conductivity. When the two lithium compounds were tested in a replacement therapy, it was found that lithium orotate had significantly reduced amyloid binding affinity and prevents pathological changes, memory loss, age-related neuroinflammation, and synapse loss in both AD-mice and ageing mice without any associated toxicity as is common in the use of lithium to treat bipolar disorder. Whereas Lithium carbonate showed a high binding affinity with amyloid plaques, making lithium unavailable for brain functions.
Current drugs in the market for Alzheimer’s target only the amyloid plaques and do not restore function or stop cognitive decline but replacement therapy with low concentrations of lithium orotate targets all the contributory factors of the disease including amyloid plaques and the accumulation of tau, another Alzheimer’s-linked protein. Evidence abounds in many studies that long-term use of trace amount of lithium in water could slow cognitive decline and prevent dementia. A study conducted in Denmark in 2017 found that locals exposed to lithium in their drinking water had lower incidence of dementia.
The first thing that probably came to your mind at the mention of lithium was battery. It might come as a shock to you to know that your brain also has natural lithium, which is essential for your brain to function properly. Lithium is found in fresh water and rivers, and in some foods and spices, including tomatoes, cereals, cabbage, potatoes, coriander seeds, nutmeg, etc. Some trace amounts can even be found in fish, diary, meat, and nuts.
Lithium relationship with health benefits is well documented and goes back as far as late 19th Century. Lithium in fact, due to belief in its medicinal benefits, was an essential part of various drinks, including soft drinks, beer, and water. The modern 7Up drink was in the early 20th Century called, Bib-Label Lithiated Lemon-Lime Soda. “Lithiated” in the name was a reference to lithium, which the drink contained in the form of the lithium salt, lithium citrate. In fact, the 7 in 7Up was a reference to the atomic weight of lithium, which is 6.94 rounded up to 7! The happy relationship between the consumers and lithium came to a crashing end in the 1940s when lithium use in drinks was banned for fear of its perceived toxicity. But lithium continued to be used in medicine up to this day as a mood stabiliser for the treatment of bipolar disorder in the form of lithium carbonate.
Lithium orotate is commonly commercially available as dietary supplements. But, tut, tut, tut, do not go munching lithium supplements without express doctor’s advice. Lithium use in the treatment of bipolar disorder in psychiatry is fraught with long-term kidney and thyroid toxicity!
