Booth Id:
BI303
Category:
Plant Sciences
Year:
2014
Finalist Names:
Agnoletti, Alberto
Mazzetto, Alessio
Abstract:
The aim of our project is to create a product which results effective in the fight against overweight lately affecting more and more young people. Our attention addressed a particular cause of binge-eating: emotional eating. The problem has already been widely recognized and treated by allopathic medicine. Our goal is to prepare a natural remedy which can be easily taken. Our dietary supplement, which appears as a disintegrating tablet with the trade name SpuntiNO’, provides the organism with those active principles aimed at controlling and limiting nervous hunger, mobilizing fat storage tissues and providing adaptogenic substances, in order to better cope with the lesser quantity of food ingested. The plants we selected after careful evaluation are Rodhiola rosea root, Griffonia simplicifolia seeds, Ashwaganda root and Theobroma cocoa seeds. The active principles of the selected plants act on the emotional sphere, improving the mood and stimulating satiety, and increase the quantity of circulating serotonin, as they both supply 5-HTP (direct serotonin precursor) and exercise an inhibitory effect on MAO.
The lab tests we carried out were aimed at determining:
1. The MgO actual title;
2. The percentage in 5-HTP present in the Griffonia simplicifolia seeds;
3. The tablet solubility;
4. The 5-HTP bioavailability.
The dietary supplement SpuntiNO’ was first tested on selected volunteers with a blind trial. The results of our test were further verified in a second experiment carried out by a local University.
Both tests have proved the efficacy of the remedy in fighting nervous hunger.