"In what the authors describe as the largest and longest study of resveratrol in people with mild to moderate Alzheimers disease theres encouraging news that the component which is found in red wine grapes and dark chocolate may keep the disease from progressing. Dr. R. Scott Turner professor of neurology and director of the memory disorders program at Georgetown University Medical Center and his team created a purified form of resveratrol which is being studied in both animal and human studies for preventing agerelated conditions such as diabetes and cancer. In a study published in Neurology he described how they randomly assigned half of a group of  men and women to take up to  mg of resveratrol daily and the other half to a placebo for a year. All of the participants had mild or moderate Alzheimers disease. At the end of the year Turner compared the peoples scores on cognitive tests and assessments of how independent they were in their daily living from the start of the study. My nightmare was that nothing would be different from the placebo group and there would be nothing of interest to talk about he says. But that did not happen. I think resveratrol is an engaging target thats very interesting and could be pharmacologically manipulated to develop a treatment. MORE Red Wine Not That Healthy After All Study Shows httptime.comredwinehealthystudy The resveratrol group showed no change in the levels of a protein that builds up in the brains of Alzheimers patients. Turners group also measured the protein in spinal fluid and blood and did not see differences over the year in the resveratrol group. Thats likely because experts believe that as Alzheimers progresses more of the protein plaques form in the brain and less of the protein is released to the rest of the body. The resveratrol group also showed smaller brain volume which in the case of Alzheimers is a positive sign as the disease can cause inflammation and swelling that can interfere with nerve connections. MORE Noteworthy Advances in Alzheimers Research httptime.comnoteworthyadvancesinalzheimersresearch Even more encouraging the people who were treated showed slight improvements in their ability to maintain certain daily activities on their own such dressing and bathing themselves. How resveratrol may be affecting the Alzheimers disease process isnt clear yet. Turner says the findings dont suggest that red wine is a cure for Alzheimers. The amounts of resveratrol in the purified doses that the participants took were extremely high and beyond those found on the market currently  around what would be contained in about  bottles of red wine. Plus he says resveratrol supplements currently available over the counter are unregulated and we dont know how much is in it. We need more studies to see if it really does have benefit and then it could be turned into more effective drugs that can better target Alzheimers.  Horrible Habits You Need to Stop Right Now next  of   Do Not Email First Thing in the Morning or Last Thing at Night The former scrambles your priorities and all your plans for the day and the latter just gives you insomnia says Ferriss who insists email can wait until am or after you check off at least one substantive todo list item. Chris PecoraroGetty Images  You Might Like Stars Walk the  Golden Globes Red Carpet   Expensive Red Carpet Outfits Correction The original version of this story misstated that all the participants were men. The study included men and women."