`Researcher to Share Details of 'Thrilling Discovery' - Olive Oil Times

Researcher to Share Details of 'Thrilling Discovery'

By Iván L. Gimeno
Nov. 17, 2014 09:34 UTC

On November 21, Gary Beauchamp, direc­tor and pres­i­dent of the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, will be in Spain to dis­cuss his well-known dis­cov­ery of the oleo­can­thal mol­e­cule, a key com­po­nent respon­si­ble for some of the her­alded health ben­e­fits of extra vir­gin olive oil.

Similar to the non­s­teroidal anti-inflam­ma­tory (NSAID) known as ibupro­fen, oleo­can­thal shares the same anti-inflam­ma­tory prop­er­ties but with­out the side effects of the med­i­cine so widely employed by the phar­macy indus­try. Oleocanthal will be explained by the man who dis­cov­ered it acci­den­tally more than a decade ago.

Dr. Gary Beauchamp

Several stud­ies after Beauchamp’s dis­cov­ery found that oleo­can­thal could help remove the pro­teins that are the main com­po­nent (known as beta-amy­loid) of the amy­loid plaques in Alzheimer patients.

Long-term con­sump­tion of small quan­ti­ties of oleo­can­thal from olive oil may be respon­si­ble in part for the low inci­dence of heart dis­ease and Alzheimer’s dis­ease asso­ci­ated with a Mediterranean diet.

In fact, Beauchamp dis­cov­ered oleo­can­thal dur­ing an exper­i­ment to improve the taste of ibupro­fen.

While research­ing mol­e­c­u­lar gas­tron­omy with a team of sci­en­tists, food spe­cial­ists and chefs, Beauchamp was con­duct­ing an olive oil tast­ing when he noticed some sim­i­lar­i­ties between the taste of a par­tic­u­lar olive oil and the ibupro­fen.

Invited by the Oleocanthal Society of Andalucia, QVExtra International and the Spanish Olive Oil Municipalities Association, Beauchamp will give a talk titled Oleocanthal: a thrilling dis­cov­ery’ at the Council of Córdoba to explain the process which took him to dis­cover the mol­e­cule in olive oil that could help improve the lives of many.


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