Honeyberry, also known as honeysuckle berry, haskap berry, and scientifically as Lonicera caerulea is a sweet berry that has was registered as a traditional food under the European union regulations in 2018 due to its numerous health and nutitional benefits. The blue colored fruits is native to the Kamchatka area in Northeast Asia, but also commonly found in Eastern Europe and Canada. It belongs to the family of Caprifoliaceae.
Due to its richness, honeyberries are regarded in Japan as elixir of life. It is rich in vitamins and minerals and possess a good amount of different bioactive phytochemicals, such as flavonoids, flavanol, flavones, polyohenols and phenolic compounds. It also contains triterpenoic acids, β-carotene, catechol, flavonols, chlorogenic acid and many more acids.
The fruit juice made of honeyberry juice fruit is sold as a “gold remedy for eternal youth and longevity”.
Health benefits of eating honeyberry
Honeyberry is well fortified with nutritional and medicinal bioactive compounds which your body needs to perform daily at optimal level. The wonderful berry is rich in vitamin C, fiber, calcium, sodium, magnesium, phosphorus and potassium. It also contains in smaller quantities proteins, fat, thiamin, riboflavin, pyridoxine, iron, copper, and zinc. All the mentioned vitamins and minerals are very essential for the cellular and tissue functions. any deficiency of any of the nutrients may result to a deficiency disease,
Honeyberry improves eyesight
Being a rich source of anthocyanin, honeyberry will keep your eyes healthy. This is because anthocyanins are known to be beneficial to the eyes in a number of ways. These may include increasing fluid circulation through the retinal capillaries, improving night vision, preventing retinopathy in diabetic patients, and help in fighting macular degeneration.
recently, there has been an increase in the number of patients with eye related complications. More worrisome is that most of the patients are still young, while a greater percentage are in their mid fifties. while some are being treated and other given medicated eyeglass, it would be a supplementation to eat honeyberry fruits on daily basis, especially for the patients.
May improve brain functions
One of the contributing factors of brain aging, dementia, Alzheimer’s and other brain related diseases is oxidative stress. Oxidative stress increases the amount of free reactive oxygen species
May protect your heart
Anthocycyanin described as one of the beneficial flavonoids in the body. It helps in preventing cardiovascular diseases through it antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities.
Through these activities, anthocycyanins improve blood circulation through the veins by neutralising enzymes responsible tissue destruction of connective tissues. This is done by repairing damaged proteins in the walls of blood vessels, thereby promoting healthy circulations.
Another compound with beneficial effect on the vascular wall and blood pressure is chlorogenic acid. Other antioxidants also contribute to the removal of oxidised low density lipoproteins. These are helpful for keeping your heart healthy and functioning at optimum level.
Honeyberry for cancer prevention
If you’re treating any of the cancer diseases, such liver cancer, colon cancer, breast and prostate cancers, honeyberry might be a helpful fruit for you. It is jot just helpful but most definitely a remedy for cancer cell growth.
According to several studies, honeyberry fruits possess strong antioxidants and anticancer components such as quercetin and kaempferol. They also possess strong presence of chlorogenic acid and ferulic acid, and luteolin.
These compounds are strong anti-cancer components. When you regularly eat honeyberry fruits, you not only protect yourself from carcinogenic agents, but also actively suppress cancer cell proliferations.
Honeyberry for diabetes
Diabetes is mainly manifested by activating the activities of α-amylase, α-glucosidase, and dipeptidyl peptidase-4, thereby inducing inflammatory symptoms. The inhibition of the above enzymes is the aim of most antidiabetic compounds. Luckily, honeyberry is packed with several active compounds that readily inhibit these enzymes and improve glucose clearance from the blood stream.
This competitive inhibition of these enzymes effectively reduced glucose production in INS-1 cells, increased insulin secretion and signal expression, and phosphorylated expression of the insulin receptor, insulin receptor substrate, and phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase protein in INS-1 cells.
Blue honeysuckle for anti-aging
There’s an increase in research for life extension, and age delay in recent times. It is actually an interesting moments given the increased attention on transhumanism and cryobiology.
Some of the commercial products of these researches include spermidine supplement. Like spermidine, honeyberry fruits possess powerful antioxidants that suppress oxidative stress and its harmful effects on our cells and DNAs.
Antioxidants prolong our life span by protecting our cells from toxic compounds that kill them and destroy our DNAs. So eat more of honeyberry fruits for your life and healthy cells.
Blue honeyberry for healthy skin
Honeyberry is packed with phytochemical compounds that offer protection on your skin from UV radiations. The fruits also possess compounds that suppress melanin secretion, thereby resulting in the whitening of your skin.
So if you want to reduce your melanin content, eat more of honeyberry fruits. The antioxidants also protect your skin from toxic chemicals. The protective effects of honeyberry on your skin can be compared the that of Ewe laali except that ewe laali, or henna as it is also called, is applied topically.
Offers neuroprotection to you
It has been reported, from studies, that daily intake of polyphenols (which are prevalent in honeysuckle berries) minimizes risk of dementia, neurodegenerative diseases and stroke mainly through free radical scavenging, activation of survival genes and signaling cascades, transition metal chelation, modification of neuroinflammation and regulation of mitochondrial function. This shows how important honeyberry is for your mental health, and overall wellbeing.
If you have an elderly man or woman in your household, one of the most rewarding thing you can do for them isn’t buying pizza, shawarma or beef for them; it is rather getting them honeyberry fruits for consumption and healthy living. This will help slow their ageing, and prevent many age related diseases such as menopause, and arthritis.
May improve memory, cognition and learning
As much as i would advise you to keep buying honeyberry for your elderly wards, i’d much more plead with you to buy even more blueberries for your children. The reason is that they so much need strong retentive memory, cognition, and learning. The polyphenols present in the honeyberry fruits have been noted to possess strong brain improvement capacities.
Honeyberry is a strong antiviral agent
Honeyberry is rich in antiviral compounds, which have shown strong activities against chickenpox virus, dengue, and the recent pandemic; the coronavirus.
According to a review study, both in vitro and in vivo experiments have confirmed that the Lonicera caerulea extract can inhibit the replication of SARS-CoV-2 and pro-mote the reverse development of the patient’s disease.
Also, a meta-analysis found that the combination of L. caerulea and conventional treatment can significantly improve patients’ symptoms such as fever and cough and improve the level of inflammatory biomarkers. Moreover, there are no adverse events in the combine.
References
Gołba, Marta et al. “Health Properties and Composition of Honeysuckle Berry Lonicera caerulea L. An Update on Recent Studies.” Molecules (Basel, Switzerland) vol. 25,3 749.
, S., J. Yu, S. Guo, H. Fang, and X. Chang. 2020. Inhibition of pancreatic α-amylase by Lonicera caerulea berry polyphenols in vitro and their potential as hyperglycemic agents. LW T 126:109288.
Jones, Q.R.D.; Warford, J.; Rupasinghe, H.P.V.; Robertson, G.S. Target-based selection of flavonoids for neurodegenerative disorders. Trends Pharmacol. Sci. 2012, 33, 602–610.
