Determining the Abundance of Eicosanoyl-5-hydroxytryptamide in Coffea Arabica Using High Performance Liquid Chromatography

Abstract

Parkinson’s disease (PD) affects between 1 and 1.5 million Americans with approximately fifty thousand new cases developing each year (University of Pennsylvania). Current literature suggests that genetics is a contributing factor towards an individual’s potential to develop Parkinson’s. Polymeropoulos (1997) correlated mutations in the α-synuclein gene to development of early-onset Parkinson’s. Fortunately, genetic predisposition only seems to represent a small minority of Parkinson’s cases, suggesting that environmental factors play a significant role in developing the condition. Caffeine stood out as a potential dietary factor that mitigated neurodegeneration; findings such as Hu et al (2007) and Hernán (2002) suggested that coffee-drinkers experienced a decreased incidence of Parkinson’s disease; their incidence inversely proportional to the average amount of coffee they consumed daily. Though the epidemiological findings show a correlation, it remains unproven whether caffeine was the compound behind the decreased Parkinson’s incidence. Here we investigate Eicosanoyl-5-hydroxytryptamide (EHT), another coffee-component shown to decrease symptoms of Parkinsonism (Lee et al, 2013). We demonstrate how brewing methods, grind type, roast, and where the coffee was grown, affect EHT content in liquid coffee and coffee beans.