Synergistic blend of astaxanthin and tocotrienols supports cognitive health, says new study

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A study recently published in the Journal of Clinical Biochemistry and Nutrition¹ found that supplementation with a combination of tocotrienols (TheraPrimE Palm Tocotrienols) and astaxanthin (AstaZine Natural Astaxanthin) from BGG World (Irvine, CA) supported the cognitive health of healthy subjects. In the randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study, 44 Japanese subjects were assigned to take a supplement containing 9 mg of astaxanthin and 50 mg of tocotrienols, or placebo every day for 12 weeks.

Results showed that subjects taking astaxanthin with tocotrienols saw significant improvements in composite memory and verbal memory at 12 weeks compared to placebo. Subjects taking the combination also had significant improvements in their subjective symptoms of memory, based on their responses to the questions: “During the last week, have you had trouble remembering people’s names or the names of things?”

“We previously demonstrated that AstaZine Natural Astaxanthin alone was able to markedly ameliorate how well subjects can recognize, remember, and retrieve words and geometric figures². In this study we decided to add 50mg of tocotrienols to the same dosage of Astaxanthin previously tested and we were able to show a statistically significant amelioration versus the placebo group on Cognitrax in addition to improvement in all subjective symptoms measured,” explains the study’s lead author Takahiro Sekikawa, PhD, in a press release. “Previous research has established synergistic antioxidant performance of a Tocotrienol + Astaxanthin blend, and it would be of great interest to investigate in future studies if this outcome is due to an ameliorated absorption of Astaxanthin or perhaps to increased antioxidant activity due to the addition of tocotrienols.”

References

1. Sekikawa T et al. “Cognitive function improvement with astaxanthin and tocotrienol intake: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study.” Journal of Clinical Biochemistry and Nutrition, Published online ahead of print on June 19, 2020
2. Sekikawa T et al. “Cognitive Function Improvement with Astaxanthin Intake: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Study.” Pharmacometrics, vol. 97 (2019): 1-13