Therapeutic Pragmatism of Grape Fruit

ABOUT AUTHOR
Raaz K Maheshwari*, Bina Rani, Sangeeta Parihar, Manisha Sharma
Department of Chemistry, MDSU’s Government PG College, Nagaur, Rajasthan
Department of Engineering Chemistry & Environmental Engineering, PCE, Sitapura, Jaipur, Rajasthan
Department of Chemistry, Jai Narain Vyas University, Jodhpur, Rajasthan
Department of Chemistry, JIET School of Engineering & Technology for Girls, Jodhpur, Rajasthan
E-mail: [email protected]

ABSTRACT
Grapes (Vitis vinifera) have been heralded for their medicinal and nutritional value for thousands of years. Egyptians ate grapes at least 6,000 years ago, and several ancient Greek philosophers praised the healing power of grapes — usually in the form of wine. European folk healers made an ointment from the sap of grapevines to treat skin and eye diseases. Grape leaves were used to stop bleeding, inflammation, and pain, such as the kind brought on by hemorrhoids. Unripe grapes were used to treat sore throats, and dried grapes (raisins) were used for constipation and thirst. Round, ripe, sweet grapes were used to treat a range of health problems including cancer, cholera, smallpox, nausea, eye infections, and skin, kidney, and liver diseases. But grapes or the chemicals within them, especially oligomeric proanthocyanidin complexes (OPCs)- have been touted as powerful antioxidants. Some people believe they could help treat a number of conditions, from heart disease to cancer to aging skin, although scientific evidence is mostly lacking for those conditions. Synthesized by many plants, resveratrol apparently serves antifungaland other defensive properties. Dietary resveratrol has been shown to modulate the metabolism oflipids and to inhibit oxidation of low-density lipoproteins and aggregation of platelets. Resveratrol is found in widely varying amounts among grape varieties, primarily in their skins and seeds which, in muscadine grapes, have about 100x higher concentration than pulp.Fresh grape skin contains about 50 to 100 μgs of resveratrol per gram. Therapeutic applications and versatilities in grapes usage has been delineated in this manuscript.
Key words: LDL; OPCs; Antioxidants; Vitamins; Minerals; Red wine; Therapeutic applications