▶ 32 Detox Drinks For Cleansing And Weight Loss
The Ultimate Collection of Healthy Drinks! Bin the sodas and make these at home.

▶ Probiotics: A Science-Supported Antiviral "Secret Weapon"
25% Reduction In Pneumonia in studies!

▶ Panic Attacks And Anxiety Linked To Low Vitamin B6 And Iron Levels.
Scientists think vitamin B6 and iron play vital role in prevention.

▶ The Death Rate From Alzheimer's Disease Has Risen By 55%.
Report from CDC and Alzheimers Association sounds the alarm.

▶ How To Make Amazing Naturally Flavored Water.
FINALLY - a drink that has tons of flavor as well as super health qualities!

▶ Tree Resins: An Amazing Yet Forgotten Natural Remedy. Trees have been among our greatest allies since ancient times!

▶ How To Open A Can Without A Can Opener (Amazing)
I have to admit when I first saw this video, my jaw dropped!

▶ Completely 100 Percent Off-Grid - 9 Essential Foods You Should Produce.
Grow these 9 foods for self-reliance in uncertain times.

▶ 10 lbs In 1 Week Cabbage Soup Diet Recipe AKA Wonder Soup. This famous weight loss soup is trending like crazy!

▶ Peasant Bread - The Best & Easiest Bread You'll Ever Make
No artificial ingredients and costs under $1 per loaf!

▶ The World's BEST Fried Fish Recipe: How To Fry Fish
Wow your friends with this one!

▶ Homemade Mozzarella Sticks
You can make crunchy and delicious mozzarella sticks at home in 10 mins!

▶ France Becomes The First Country To Ban All Five Pesticides Linked To Bee Deaths.
Good move, France!

▶ This Astonishing Transparent Solar Cell Could Turn Every Window And Screen Into A Power Source.
Breakthrough technology!

▶ PLEASE Pick Up Your ****ing Trash!
TAKE ACTION! It never used to be like this. We MUST leave a better world for our kids!

▶ Global Forest Area Has INCREASED 7.1% Since 1982, But The Media Won't Report It.
Nature Scientific Journal report reveals the astonishing truth.

Mastic

Background & General Info

Mastic gum is an aromatic lemon-white resin secreted from the stem of Pistacia lentiscus, an evergreen shrub that is very commonly distributed in the eastern Mediterranean region but is cultivated uniquely in Chios, a Greek island in the Aegean off the Anatolian coast. It is acquired as an exudate by “hurting” the trunk and branches of the plant and is called the “Chios tears” because of its shape. ^[1][2]

Mastic - Botany

Pistacia lentiscus is an evergreen tree or shrub with alternately arranged, leathery, and pinnately compound leaves with winged petioles and five or six pairs of deep-green leaflets. Its stem is reddish in coloration at an early stage of growth but becomes grayish upon maturity. Although rarely present, the fruit is a drupe that transitions in appearance from red to black when ripe. ^[2]

Mastic - History & Traditional Use

For more than 2,500 years, mastic gum has long been indicated in the traditional Greek medicinal system for a variety of gastrointestinal disorders such as stomach pain, dyspepsia, and peptic ulcer. In fact, its therapeutic properties had been mentioned in the works of the likes of Hippocrates, Dioscorides, Theophrastos, and Galenos, well-known ancient Greek physicians who recommended its use. ^[1] A number of Roman, Byzantine, Arab, and European authors had also extensively cited mastic’s healing properties. ^[3] Apart from its traditional remedial use, mastic gum is at present used as a seasoning in Mediterranean cuisines, in the production of chewing gum and food products, in perfumery, and in dentistry. ^[1]

Mastic - Herbal Uses

The essential oil and gum of the mastic tree are both used as natural antimicrobial agents with extensive uses in medicine, especially as a deterrent to gastric diseases and ulcers by acting against Helicobacter pylori according to evidence from modern in vivo and in vitro scientific research. ^[3][4] Mastic gum is also used as remedy for liver inflammation and disorders associated with the stomach and intestine and is said to be beneficial for the teeth. ^[5] There is ample evidence that points out the hepatoprotective, cardioprotective, and antiatherogenic properties of mastic gum. ^[6] Moreover, a number of studies have proven the antimicrobial, antifungal, antioxidant, hypolipidemic, anti-inflammatory, anti-Crohn, and anticancer properties of mastic, making it a therapeutic resin with a wide range of applications as a nature-originated treatment. ^[3]

Mastic - Constituents / Active Components

According to a 2005 chemical analysis using gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS), alpha-pinene, beta-myrcene, beta-pinene, limonene, and beta-caryophyllene are the chief components of mastic oil and gum. ^[4] A 2014 Japanese study also analyzed the chemical composition of mastic gum essential oil through GC–MS and identified its components, which are tabulated below, with α-pinene being the major constituent: ^[7]

Mastic - Medicinal / Scientific Research

Anti-inflammatory:

A 2010 study demonstrated the anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects of mastic gum. Mastic gum significantly inhibited the carrageenan-induced edema at all doses, denoting anti-inflammatory activity. At an intraperitoneal dose of 800 mg/kg, it completely inhibited the inflammation without producing any toxicity in mice. Mastic gum also showed weak DPPH and nitric oxide scavenging activities and good ferrous iron (Fe2+)-chelating ability. ^[8] Based on the research results of Triantafyllou et al. (2011), the anti-inflammatory property of Chios mastic gum is linked to its inhibition of oxidative stress elicited by tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α). Mastic gum dose-dependently prevented the cellular production of superoxide and H2O2 in aortic smooth muscle cells of rats treated with TNF-α and entirely eliminated the increase in cellular TNF-α-stimulated superoxide production. In addition, mastic gum had been revealed to inhibit the activity of purified protein kinase C, to diminish the activity of protein kinase C in cell homogenate, and to attenuate the production of superoxide in cells. ^[5]

Anticancer:

Recently, several studies have further investigated the potential antiproliferative or anticancer properties of mastic gum against various types of human neoplasia and the triterpenoid constituents of mastic gum emerge to be largely accountable to its anticancer potential. ^[6] Balan et al. (2007) reported that compounds from 50% ethanol extract of Chios mastic gum inhibit the proliferation and trigger the death of HCT116 human colon cancer cells in vitro. Chios mastic gum had been noted to time- and dose-dependently cause induction of cell arrest at G1 phase of cell cycle; detachment of the cancer cells from the substrate; activation of procaspase-8, procaspase-9, and procaspase-3; and a number of apoptotic morphological changes in cell organelles. Additionally, it seems that Chios mastic gum kills cancer cells through a pathway not associated with death receptor- and mitochondrion-dependent pathways since its induction of apoptosis was not suppressed in HCT116 cell clones that expressed high levels of the anti-apoptotic protein, Bcl-2, or dominant-negative FADD. ^[9]

Antibacterial And Antifungal:

An early preliminary 1996 study established the in vitro antimicrobial activity of extracts from Pistacia lentiscus, the evergreen shrub from which the aromatic mastic resin is obtained from, especially on the Greek island of Chios. Decoctions produced from mastic demonstrated the best antibacterial activity against Sarcina lutea, Staphylococcus aureus, and Escherichia coli and interesting antimicrobial effect against the fungi Candida albicans, Candida parapsilosis, Torulopsis glabrata, and Cryptococcus neoformans. ^[10]

A 2010 randomized pilot study confirmed the bactericidal activity of mastic gum against Helicobacter pylori, a Gram-negative bacteria notorious for causing infection and chronic inflammation in the stomach lining. Four out of thirteen patients who received 350 mg of pure mastic gum and five out of thirteen patients administered with 1.05 g of pure mastic gum, both thrice a day for 14 days, had eradication of Helicobacter pylori, as confirmed by a (13)C urea breath test (UBT). In this study wherein UBT testing was performed 5 weeks after the conclusion of the Helicobacter pylori eradication regime, excellent tolerance with mastic gum was observed among all patients, with no serious adverse events having been documented. ^[11] Treatment using total mastic extract without polymer at an average dose of 0.75 mg/day for 3 months caused a nearly 30-fold reduction in the Helicobacter pylori colonization (1.5 log CFU/g of tissue) in mice infected with Helicobacter pylori SS1. Furthermore, in a test for in vitro activity against a panel of 11 Helicobacter pylori clinical strains, the acid fraction of mastic extract was demonstrated to be most active, with a minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC) of 0.139 mg/mL. The most active pure compound was found to be isomasticadienolic acid, with an MBC of 0.202 mg/mL. ^[1]

By employing disk diffusion method, Koutsoudaki et al. (2005) investigated the antibacterial activity of 12 components of mastic oil and identified verbenone, alpha-terpineol, and linalool as among the many trace components that seem to be responsible for the antibacterial activity of mastic oil. ^[4] Active constituents of mastic had been astoundingly verified by Miyamoto et al. (2014) to show antibacterial activity against clarithromycin-resistant and/or metronidazole-resistant Helicobacter pylori strains. In particular, (E)-methyl isoeugenol and α-terpineol were potent against drug-sensitive and drug-resistant strains and displayed much higher antibacterial activity against Helicobacter pylori than the same dose of the mastic essential oil itself. ^[7]

Peptic ulcer:

Local populations of Chios employ mastic to relieve gastralgia (or stomach pain) and prevent the occurrence of peptic ulcer. ^[1] An early double-blind clinical trial carried in 1984 determined the ability of mastic to heal ulcers in patients diagnosed with symptomatic and endoscopically proven duodenal ulcers. In this study, oral daily intake of 1 gram of mastic by 20 patients for 2 weeks led to symptomatic relief in 80% of patients and endoscopically proven healing in 70% of patients, with a highly significant difference between mastic treatment and placebo (p<0.01). Moreover, the mastic treatment was well tolerated by patients and did not cause side effects. ^[12] Later on, in 1986, a study provided observations that verified the clinical effectiveness of mastic as treatment of duodenal ulcer, which was elucidated to be likely attributable to mastic’s mild antisecretory and localized adaptive cytoprotectant activities. Gastric and duodenal ulcers were experimentally stimulated in rats in this study, and mastic was orally provided at a dose of 500 mg/kg. Its administration significantly reduced the intensity of gastric mucosal damage and decreased the free acidity in 6-hour pylorus-ligated rats. A discernible cytoprotective effect was also observed against 50% ethanol in rats. ^[13]

Dyspepsia:

Findings from a 2010 prospective randomized double-blind placebo-controlled trial evinced the efficacy of mastic gum to considerably improve symptoms of functional dyspepsia in patients, including general stomach pain, stomach pain associated with anxiety, dull discomfort in the upper abdomen, and heartburn. The trial randomly assigned 148 patients suffering from functional dyspepsia to either Chios mastic gum treatment at a dose of 350 mg three times a day or placebo. The symptom scores of patients receiving mastic gum, as evaluated using the Hong Kong index of dyspepsia, were significantly lower than those of the placebo group, with 77% of mastic-treated individuals having been discerned to have marked symptomatic improvement. ^[14]

Mastic - Contraindications, Interactions, And Safety

Mastic gum and essential oil is generally safe to use, with adverse reaction only limited to hypersensitivity and no drug interactions having been documented. Because of insufficient information and research data, pregnant and breastfeeding women should avoid its use without a medical professional's supervision.

Article researched and created by Dan Ablir for herbshealthhappiness.com.
© herbshealthhappiness.com

Privacy Policy | Cookie Policy | GDPR | About This Site