Overview

• The DIRECT PLUS randomized trial followed about 300 adults for 18 months across three diet arms: a standard healthy diet, a calorie-restricted Mediterranean diet, and a green-enhanced Mediterranean plan.
• Those on the green-enhanced plan showed larger decreases in circulating proteins previously associated with accelerated brain aging than participants in the other groups.
• The green-enhanced approach added daily green tea and Mankai, an aquatic duckweed plant, to the traditional Mediterranean pattern.
• Researchers from Ben-Gurion University, the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, and the University of Leipzig reported the findings in Clinical Nutrition and described them as associative biomarker results.
• The team highlighted the ‘brain age gap’ biomarker’s links to mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer’s risk and called for replication, longer follow-up, and mechanistic studies.