Banaba
Botanical Description & Habitat
Banaba
Other names:
Lagerstroemia speciosa L.
Queen's Crape Myrtle
Queen's flower
Botany:
A decidious tropical flowering tree, 5 to 7 m high, sometimes growing to a height of 20 meters. Leaves, large, spatulate, 2-4 inches in width, 5-8 inches in length; shedding its leaves the first months of the year. Before shedding, the leaves are bright orange or red during which time it is thought to contain higher levels of corosolic acid). Flowers are racemes, pink to lavender; flowering from March to June. After flowering, the tree bears large clumps of oval nutlike fruits.
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Supplement |
Banaba Leaf |
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Description |
Banaba is a medicinal plant that grows in India, Southeast Asia and the Philippines. Traditional uses include brewing tea from the leaves as a treatment for diabetes and hyperglycemia (elevated blood sugar). The hypoglycemic (blood sugar lowering) effect of banaba leaf extract is similar to that of insulin — which induces glucose transport from the blood into body cells. |
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Claims |
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Theory |
Banaba leaf extract contains a triterpenoid compound known as corosolic acid — which has actions in stimulating glucose transport into cells. As such, banaba plays a role in regulating levels of blood sugar and insulin in the blood. For some people, fluctuations in blood sugar and insulin are related to appetite, hunger and various food cravings — particularly craving for carbohydrates such as bread and sweets. By keeping blood sugar and insulin levels in check, banaba may be an effective supplement for promoting weight loss in certain individuals. |
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Scientific Support |
The blood sugar regulating properties of banaba have been demonstrated in cell culture, animal and human studies. In isolated cells, the active ingredient in banaba extract, corosolic acid, is known to stimulate glucose uptake. In diabetic mice, rats and rabbits, banaba feeding reduces elevated blood sugar and insulin levels to normal. In humans with type II diabetes, banaba extract, at a dose of 16-48mg per day for 4-8 weeks, has been shown to be effective in reducing blood sugar levels (5%-30% reduction) and maintaining tighter control of blood sugar fluctuations. An interesting “side-effect” of tighter control of blood sugar and insulin levels is a significant tendency of banaba to promote weight loss (an average of 2-4 lbs. per month) — without significant dietary alterations. It is likely that modulation of glucose and insulin levels reduces total caloric intake somewhat and encourages moderate weight loss. |
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Safety |
At suggested doses, 8-48mg per day, no adverse side effects are expected from banaba extract. Higher doses should be avoided, however, to prevent possible hypoglycemic effects (headache, dizziness, fatigue) commonly associated with extremely low blood glucose levels. |
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Value |
As a dietary supplement to help reduce elevated levels of sugar and insulin in the blood, banaba extract has been shown to be safe and effective. As a weight loss aid, a handful of small (unpublished) studies in humans have suggested that tighter control of blood glucose and insulin can help promote moderate weight loss. |
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Dosage |
Doses of banaba extract in the range of 16-48mg per day, consumed in divided doses with meals, are effective in reducing blood glucose and insulin levels. Higher doses should be avoided due to the potential for hypoglycemia (low blood sugar). |
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References |
1. Kakuda T, Sakane I, Takihara T, Ozaki Y, Takeuchi H, Kuroyanagi M. Hypoglycemic effect of extracts from Lagerstroemia speciosa L. leaves in genetically diabetic KK-AY mice. Biosci Biotechnol Biochem. 1996 Feb;60(2):204-8. 2. Murakami C, Myoga K, Kasai R, Ohtani K, Kurokawa T, Ishibashi S, Dayrit F, Padolina WG, Yamasaki K. Screening of plant constituents for effect on glucose transport activity in Ehrlich ascites tumour cells. Chem Pharm Bull (Tokyo). 1993 Dec;41(12):2129-31. 3. Suzuki Y, Unno T, Ushitani M, Hayashi K, Kakuda T. Antiobesity activity of extracts from Lagerstroemia speciosa L. leaves on female KK-Ay mice. J Nutr Sci Vitaminol (Tokyo). 1999 Dec;45(6):791-5. |
Distribution:
Grows wild; widely distributed in the Philippines. Propagation by seeds.
Parts utilized:
Leaves and bark
Uses:
Folkloric
Roots have been used for a variety of stomach ailments. Leaf decoction for diabetes; also use as a diuretic and purgative. The bark decoction has been used for the treatment of diarrhea.
Commercial availability:
Tablets, extracts, capsules, powder and tea
Drug Interactions & precautions
Known Interactions
Cell glucose uptake
Dr. Yamazaki, professor of Pharmaceutical Science, Hiroshima University School of Medicine, Japan, studied the effects of corosolic acid in relation to its insulin-like properties. His studies indicate that corosolic acid activates the transport of glucose across cell membranes, resulting in blood sugar reductions. Insulin is the hormone that naturally increases glucose transport activity across cell membranes. In the Type II diabetic, cell membranes are often less responsive to insulin-induced glucose uptake.
Oral administration of insulin does not reduce blood sugar, whereas orally administered corosolic acid can produce a drop in blood sugar levels. Large doses of injected insulin are capable of producing adverse reactions, while oral doses of corosolic acid have no known side effects. In rabbits, oral doses of corosolic acid have been shown to act similarly to subcutaneous injections of insulin. Hence, corosolic acid may be defined as a phyto-insulin or insulin-like plant extract
Historical Properties & Uses
A Natural Approach To Lowering Blood Sugar
Diabetes affects 16 million people in the United States and is the fourth leading cause of death. Diabetes is also the principal cause of blindness in adults and is the most common cause of kidney failure. Neuropathy, artery disease and premature aging are common conditions associated with chronically elevated blood sugar levels.
Type I Diabetes, often called juvenile diabetes, is insulin dependent and affects only 5% of the diabetic population. Type II Diabetes, or non-insulin dependent diabetes, usually develops in adults over the age of 40. In recent years, there has been an increase in the incidence of Type II diabetes.
People with Type II diabetes often show no symptoms. Type II diabetes occurs as a result of the decline in cell membrane insulin sensitivity that can be aggravated by the consumption of high-glycemic carbohydrates, obesity, lack of exercise and the aging process.
Various medicinal plants from India, China and Japan are used for the treatment of diabetes. The most effective plant constituent appears to be corosolic acid, which can be found in the leaves of the Lagestroemia Speciosa L tree.
Cell glucose uptake
Dr. Yamazaki, professor of Pharmaceutical Science, Hiroshima University School of Medicine, Japan, studied the effects of corosolic acid in relation to its insulin-like properties. His studies indicate that corosolic acid activates the transport of glucose across cell membranes, resulting in blood sugar reductions. Insulin is the hormone that naturally increases glucose transport activity across cell membranes. In the Type II diabetic, cell membranes are often less responsive to insulin-induced glucose uptake.
Oral administration of insulin does not reduce blood sugar, whereas orally administered corosolic acid can produce a drop in blood sugar levels. Large doses of injected insulin are capable of producing adverse reactions, while oral doses of corosolic acid have no known side effects. In rabbits, oral doses of corosolic acid have been shown to act similarly to subcutaneous injections of insulin. Hence, corosolic acid may be defined as a phyto-insulin or insulin-like plant extract.
Preclinical studies
Glucose transport is the most important way that cells acquire energy. An increase of glucose transport through the cell membrane facilitates the lowering of blood sugar. Therefore, finding a safe activator of glucose transport is crucial to the Type II diabetic. Ehrlich ascites tumor cells are useful for screening the glucose transport potential of natural products. In one study, the time course of glucose uptake by Ehrlich cells was measured and corosolic acid showed significant glucose transport-stimulating activity.
COROSOLiC ACID (Chemical Structural formula of Corosolic Acid)
--- Its mass production techniques render a giant stride possible towards freedom from mild diabetes in the everyday life of all. ---
Nothing seems so amazing and fantastic as "BANABA", as a shrub of the loosestrife family. Coming under another name of crape myrtle, BANABA is a familiar plant puts on beautiful flowers in mid-summer. Because of its graceful surface texture and pretty floral shape, the plant is sometimes referred to as noble "Divine Flower".
In the recent years, the pharmacological effects of the plant have been found to range ever wider. Its efficacy for diabetes and obesity, two of the ailments often called living habit-induced sickness, has been characteristically so pioneering that the name "Pioneer Plant" has also been put to the shrub. Its applications are found not only in health foods. Themselves in fierce competition for market share, manufacturers of functional foods, such as beverage manufacturers, bread baking concerns, confectioners, pharmaceutical companies, etc., have also come to be profoundly attracted to the possibilities which the pioneer plant is believed to have.
"Corosolic acid" which is found in BANABA is a kind of vegetable protein, first discovered by Prof. Kazuo Yamazaki, Medical Dept., Hiroshima University. The occurrence of this special compound was almost simultaneously verified by Prof. Keisuke Ohsawa, Tohoku College of Pharmacy.
Dubbed "treatment diabetes work", the work of corosolic acid is epoch-making in that its effect are obtainable even by oral administration, which only enhances what is called a "glucose transport", or a sugar transport activity. Unlike conventional insulin injections or diabetic drugs administration of which is accompanied by pains or side effects, "corosolic acid", if it is given by mouth, does extricate a large reserve corps of diabetics from those afflictions.
Being an initiator and enhancer of this work, "corosolic acid" is a type of hormone, whose work or actions "cannot be considered to be unilateral or independent", according to the professors introduced above.
In this regard, BANABA has since been found to contain what the world's medical, pharmacological or other relevant scientific societies have yet to report, namely "Lageracetal", a fatty acid and "Lager-tannin", a tropical tannin variety. According to Indian, Thai and other Asian literature on medical herbs, a wide range and variety of BANABA's effects are reported, from those on hypertension, renal diseases, to those on ulcers, swelling wounds, etc. No wonder, many more scientists will most likely be motivated to study the large potentials and capabilities which the pioneer plant prossesses or may have in larger numbers yet in store.
Admittedly, not a few people have tended to view BANABA and the like as "being only said to be effective against such and such diseases". In the "absence of any numerical evidence' to support them, they are apt to suspect, health foods are not as effective as being rumored. Indeed, price-wise also, some of the products sold are far from reasonable, a fact which together with other factors are causing many a consumer organizations, beginning with consumers' co-operatives (co-ops) --- that normally have a severe critical eye for foods --- to refrain from purchasing some, if not all, of what are being sold as health foods.
It is in order to address those problems at a stretch that a new venture business has now made a debut. It is none other than USE TECHNO CORPORATION, a company that has roots in Japanese and western style confectioners and that has recently conducted a thoroughgoing survey of, BANABA trees. Already the new venture has completed numbering about five million BANABA trees in South East Asia and has entered relevant data into computers. With those entries as a database, it has already identified those tree types which have rich "corosolic acid" contents. This has rendered mass production and now low pricing possible. Meanwhile, clinical tests were carried out digitally express BANABA effects in terms of "blood sugar levels".
The conduct of the clinical tests was headed by Prof. Yoshio Ikeda (The Jikei University School of Medicine), Chairman of the Japan Obesity Society, and was participated in the Chen Duandong Clinic, the Aichi clinic and those experts graduated from the Medicine Faculty, University of Tokyo and having deep understanding of Chinese medicine and herb medicine. In the planning and execution of the tests, the like of which often tend to be carried out in the methods learning towards the interest of pharmaceutical companies, the inspection procedures actually adopted followed, instead, what might be described as an American approach, namely the method used by the Contract Research Organization (CRO), a neutral clinical inspection institute. Accordingly, for the first time, perhaps, for the foods of this type under discussion, a range of full-fledged clinical trials were executed in a scientifically satisfactory manner.
The results of all this is the development of corosolic acid a new raw materials of foods, which before the discovery by Japan has been disposed of locally in the south East Asia and whose epochal utilization by mass production has become established by Japanese enterprises. In Japan alone, 13,700,000 people are diabetic. According to the WHO (World Health Organization), the onset of the 21st century will see the number of diabetics explosively rise to a total of 300,000,000 in the less-developed nations also. It may not be long, however, before "BANABA" will be made available to those diabetics as a standard articles of daily foodstuffs. To think that the sweetness of the rice cakes each wrapped in an oak leaf (or "Kashiwamochi" in Japanese) or pink rice cakes each wrapped with a salted cherry leaf ("Sakuramochi") has lead to the discovery of this super food ingredient!
Method of Action
The effects of extracts isolated from Lagerstroemia speciosa L. (banaba) on glucose transport and adipocyte differentiation in 3T3-L1 cells were studied. Glucose uptake-inducing activity of banaba extract (BE) was investigated in differentiated adipocytes using a radioactive assay, and the ability of BE to induce differentiation in preadipocytes was examined by Northern and Western blot analyses. The hot water BE and the banaba methanol eluent (BME) stimulated glucose uptake in 3T3-L1 adipocytes with an induction time and a dose-dependent response similar to those of insulin. Furthermore, there were no additive or synergistic effects found between BE and insulin on glucose uptake, and the glucose uptake activity of insulin could be reduced to basal levels by adding increasing amounts of BE. Unlike insulin, BE did not induce adipocyte differentiation in the presence of 3-isobutyl-1-methylxanthine (IBMX) and dexamethasone (DEX). BE inhibited the adipocyte differentiation induced by insulin plus IBMX and DEX (IS-IBMX-DEX) of 3T3-L1 preadipocytes in a dose-dependent manner. The differences in the glucose uptake and differentiation inhibitory activities between untreated cells and those treated with BE were significant (P < 0.01). The inhibitory activity was further demonstrated by drastic reductions of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma2 (PPARgamma2) mRNA and glucose transporter-4 (GLUT4) protein in cells induced from preadipocytes with IS-IBMX-DEX in the presence of BE. The unique combination of a glucose uptake stimulatory activity, the absence of adipocyte differentiation activity and effective inhibition of adipocyte differentiation induced by IS-IBMX-DEX in 3T3-L1 cells suggest that BE may be useful for prevention and treatment of hyperglycemia and obesity in type II diabetics.
PMID: 11533261 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
J Nutr. 2001 Sep;131(9):2242-7.
Edison Biotechnology Institute, Department of Biomedical Sciences, College of Osteopathic
Medicine, Athens, OH 45701, USA.
Multimedia
Image not AvailablePreparation & Administration
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Dosage |
Doses of banaba extract in the range of 8-48mg per day, consumed in divided doses with meals, are effective in reducing blood glucose and insulin levels. Higher doses should be avoided due to the potential for hypoglycemia (low blood sugar). |
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Safety |
At suggested doses, 8-48mg per day, no adverse side effects are expected from banaba extract. Higher doses should be avoided, however, to prevent possible hypoglycemic effects (headache, dizziness, fatigue) commonly associated with extremely low blood glucose levels.
Note: This Herbal preparation information is a summary of data and articles from various authors. It is not intended to replace the advice or attention of health care professionals |
References
PMID: 9063966 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Planta Med. 2002 Feb;68(2):173-5. PMID: 11859474 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
PMID: 11533261 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
J Nutr. 2001 Sep;131(9):2242-7.
Central Research Institute, Itoen, Ltd., Sagara-cho, Haibara-gun, Shizuoka, Japan.
PMID: 9063966 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
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Biosci Biotechnol Biochem. 1996 Feb;60(2):204-8.
PMID: 10737232 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
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Safety
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At suggested doses, 8-48mg per day, no adverse side effects are expected from banaba extract. Higher doses should be avoided, however, to prevent possible hypoglycemic effects (headache, dizziness, fatigue) commonly associated with extremely low blood glucose levels. |
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