There are several benefits of perilla frutescens leaves, stem, flowers, and seed oil. Perilla leaves, seeds and its oil are of important use in several regions of the world, such as China, Japan, Korea, and India for the preparations of food spices, condiments, sauces, tea, vegetables and herbal medicines. In China and Japan, especially, Perilla is used also used in formulating antidepressant and anti-asthmatic herbal teas.
That’s to tell you what a wonder Perilla frutescens is. The plant belongs to the mint family, Lamiacaea. It originate in East Asia, but has been cultivated in the west due to its growing economic importance. The plant is green and looks like scent leaf plant, but in essence, the two are entirely different.
Nutritional benefits of Perilla leaves and seeds
Perilla leaves and seeds serve great purposes and are beneficial in seasoning and flavoring foods, sauce, pepper soups and beverages. Perilla seeds possess more lipid than groundnuts, mustard seeds and slightly less than sunflower seeds. The seeds contain protein, carbohydrates, calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, iron, manganese, zinc, copper, and chromium.
Health benefits of perilla leaves and stem
Known for its antiaging properties, perilla leaves possess several other great health benefits which you may be amazed at after reading through this article.
Beneficial for cancer treatment
Perilla leaves is beneficial for preventing colon and lung cancer. It has been used widely for the tumor prevention and cure, and most people have reported its efficacy. In a study where the HCT116 and H1299 cancer cells were treated with perilla leaf extract, the result showed a dose-dependent inhibition of growth by 52-92% ( at the concentration of 87.5, 175, and 350 µg/ml). At 350 µg/ml concentration, perilla leaves administration resulted in change of the nucleus morphology and significantly increased sub-G1 cell population in both cells, indicating its apoptosis-inducing activity.
In another study, ethanol extract of Perilla leaf extract triggered apoptosis in human leukemia HL-60 cells by a combination of death receptor-mediated, mitochondrial, and endoplasmic reticulum stress-induced mechanisms, and significantly inhibited cell growth through p21-mediated G1 phase arrest, and in human colon adenocarcinoma DLD-1 cells, it promotes apoptosis through caspase-dependent and caspase-independent mechanisms.
The leaves of Perilla frutescens possess several bioactive chemicals that are of great benefits to man, some of these compounds such as polyphenols, flavonoids and alkaloids possess anticancer activities, which may explain the anticancer benefits of Perilla leaves.
Perilla leaves is beneficial for preventing depression
Perilla leaves is composed of Apigenin and caffeic acid, which d to inhibit the emotional abnormality produced by stress. This activity of the the antidepressants is possibly mediated by the dopaminergic mechanisms in the mouse brain. Another important antidepressant present in perilla is Luteolin. This mean that perilla leaf tea could be help you sleep well at night, suppress insomnia and enhance relaxation through its neuropsychological functions.
Perilla leaves protect your kidney from toxic agents
Rosmarinic acid is a major polyphenolic component of Perilla frutescens. It is a hepatoprotective compound, which exerts its functions by scavenging superoxides and peroxynitrite. This way, it protects your liver from liver injury that can be caused by free radicals.
Another active compound in perilla leaves is caffeic acid. This acid will increase the concentration of the endogenous antioxidant enzymes and glutathione, and decrease lipid peroxidation. When taken together with Rosmarinic, their hepatoprotective activities will greatly increase. For instance, in a study conducted by Sung-Yong Yang and his colleagues, both Rosmarinic acid and caffeic acid independently exhibited significant reduction of indicators of hepatic toxicity such as aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, oxidized glutathione, and lipid peroxidation.
This benefits of Perilla leaves on liver health and functions is very important. There has been an increased rate of liver related diseases of recent, and most of the cases resulted in death. For someone with such diseases, a cup of perilla leaves tea, morning and night, would definitely attenuate liver toxicity.
Perilla leaves can lower your cholesterol level
Another functions of apigenin and luteolin is in the clearing of bad cholesterol from the body. These two compounds decrease lipid accumulation in adipose tissues a d serum levels of total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, which is often called the bad cholesterol, and triacylglycerol. But they greatly increased the levels of high-density lipoprotein, which is the good cholesterol. So if you are looking for something to clear cholesterol from your body, you just got that in perilla leaves.
Perilla leaves are beneficial for your heart
Perilla leaves improve your heart function through the increase in myocardial contraction and and relaxation of cardiac muscle cells, and regulate both the inotropic and lucitropic effects in your heart muscles.
Aside this, the hypolipidemic activity of the leaves also prevent the risk of atherosclerosis and other risk factors of myocardial infarction. It antioxidant is employed in detoxification of the heart cells and improve heart pumping rate. Perilla leaves may also possess cardiac protective effects like avocado seed. There, a combination of perilla leaves and seeds powder and that of avocado seed in a herbal tea my exert greater protective effects against myocardial infarction.
Perilla leaves possess neuroprotective activity
The leaves of perilla possess great benefits for your neuronal health. It can reverse the effect of beta-amyloid induced toxicity by decreasing oxidative stress, and by inhibiting tau-protein hyperphosphorylation.
The plant leaves are also beneficial for vascular dementia; it diminished the structural and functional deteriorations that is commonly exhibited in patients with vascular dementia. Another function of the leaves of perilla are in the attenuation of memory deficit and hippocampal neuronal death, which are the two essential features of vascular dementia.
Perilla leaves may also be beneficial for people suffering Alzheimer’s disease, especially with regards to restoration of memory loss.
Perilla leaves can protect you from ulcer
Gastric ulcers are common problems of the upper gastrointestinal tract disorders, and are commonly caused by nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs). In fact, they are the most aggressive leading factors of gastric ulcers.
The anti-ulcer benefits of perilla leaves is associated with the rich Rosmarinic acid presence. This compound protects the mucosa wall from NSAIDs induced ulcer through anti-inflammatory and antiapoptotic mechanisms which should be investigated further. This anti-ulcer activity of perilla leaves has made scientists to suggest that the leaves could be a potential alternative source of Rosmarinic acid as a therapeutic agent and food supplement for NSAID-induced gastric injuries. Another great anti-ulcer herb you would like to know about is cabbage juice. You cabbage and perilla leaves together and drink for effective and efficient healing processes.
Perilla leaves and seed oil are good for your skin
If you are looking for herbal remedies for collagen and melanin, you have just read about one. The effectiveness of perilla leaves extract on collagen and melanin suppression have led to cosmetics industries using it as a skin lightening agent in their cream formulation. But that is not all, the leaves possess bioactive compounds that suppress skin aging and protect you from the damaging effect of UV hazardous effects on your skin. The leaf extract like comfrey seeds improve skin elasticity and reduce hyperpigmentation without any skin irritations.
Perilla leaves also possess natural anti-allergic compound that can protect your skin from allergic reactions to environmental pollutant and toxins by significantly reducing NO production, PGE2 secretion, and proinflammatory cytokines through the downregulation of mRNA expression and protein production of proinflammatory mediators and inhibiting the ERK1/2, JNK, p38, as well as NF-κB signaling.
The ability to protect human skin fibroblasts from paraben-induced biosynthesis, secretion, and degradation of collagen via pERK1/1, MMP1/2, and TIMP1/2, makes perilla leaves a better alternative to synthetic skin lightening agents.
Perilla leaves are beneficial for hypertension
Perilla leaves and seed oil is enriched with Alpha-linoleic acid (ALA), an omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid molecule (ω-3 ALA, C18:3), which confers the oil with antithrombotic, antiarrhythmic, antiatherosclerosis, anti-inflammatory, and neuroprotective effects. The anti-atherosclerotic activity of the leaf oil is very crucial for prevention of high blood pressure and cardiac heart arrest.
Atherosclerosis is a risk factor of hypertension. It is a condition in which the blood vessels are blocked due to the deposition of low-density lipoproteins on the arterial walls. This increases the pressure of blood flow and the rate at which the heart pumps blood.
With the hypolipidemic effect of the leaves and oil, perilla leaves have proven to be beneficial for preventive and curative effect on hypertension. Another herbal remedy with such strong anti-hypertensive activity is avocado seed tea or powder. When, joined together, the two may speed up the healing process of hypertensive patients.
Perilla leaves for Covid-19 virus and HIV
Aside the numerous benefits of perilla leaves mentioned above, it is still amazing that these wonderful natural gift has strong antiviral activity against SARS-CoV-2 virus and HIV. Two different studies have proved the inhibitory potential of perilla leaves extract against viral multiplications. In a study conducted by Wen-Fang Tang and colleagues, they demonstrate for the first time that perilla leaf extract is capable of inhibiting SARS-CoV-2 replication by inactivating the virion. Additionally, they showed that perilla leaf extract significantly decreases virus-induced cytokine release and viral protein/RNA levels in the human lung epithelial cell line Calu-3. When combined with remdesivir the extract show an additive-to-synergistic efficacy against SARS-CoV-2, making perilla leaves a good candidate for treating covid-19 viral infection.
Meanwhile, another study found that Pf-gp6, a 6 kDa glycoprotein purified from the hot-water extract of Perilla frutescens Britton, effectively inhibited HIV-1-induced CPE, giant cell formation, and reverse transcription. Perilla leaves may also be strong remedies for hepatitis B virus, owing to its effective antiviral properties.
Perilla leaf tea recipe
Due to its crucial benefits, perilla leaf tea would be a great detox and sleeping tea for the night. A cup of perilla tea after dinner would do a great job in our body, starting from preventing depression, detoxifying your body to remediating certain disease conditions.
Ingredients
- A basketful of perilla leaves
- Ginger
- 1 1/2 cups of clean water
- Honey/orange
Instructions
Stage 1
- Spray your perilla leaves and ginger slices under a shade to dry
- Grind both to powder, separately.
- Store in dry containers
Stage 2
- Put 1 1/2 cups of water a pot or kettle and boil
- Add two spoons of your dry perilla leaf powder and a spoonful of ginger powder in a tea sack and deep inside the boiling water.
- Reduce the heat and allow to simmer for 5 mins.
- Bring down the tea and strain into a cup.
- Add your honey or fresh orange juice
- Enjoy your tea.
Conclusion
The benefits of perilla leaves are too numerous to mention all in this articles, however, subsequent updates shall be made with regards to new findings and proof. Aside the leaves, the seed oil of perilla is as essentially beneficial to your health as the leaves, or even more beneficial. The benefits of perilla seed oil shall be treated in our next article.
References
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Yang EJ, Ku SK, Lee W, Lee S, Lee T, Song KS, et al. Barrier protective effects of rosmarinic acid on HMGB1-induced inflammatory responses in vitro and in vivo. J Cell Physiol 2013;228:975-82. doi: 10.1002/jcp.24243, PMID 23042518.
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