All we can relate blueberry to is a creamy portion of cheesecake! The deep purple colour and sweet-tangy taste has garnered blueberry a fair share of dedicated fan-base. Alongside, this fruit from the berry family is also packed with several essential nutrients, making it a healthy option to include in your daily diet. It is dubbed to keep your heart healthy, manage blood pressure and diabetes, improve gut-health and aid brain functioning by slowing down cognitive decline and more. Further adding to the benefits, a new study has found that blueberry can also contribute to muscle growth and repair in women.

The study, conducted at Cornell University, in Ithaca, New York, looked into how serum of the participants (on blueberry-enriched diet) affected the cells responsible for muscle growth and repair in women. The findings were published in the Journal of ‘Nutrition’.

The researchers examined 22 women for over six weeks, out of whom 12 were aged between 25 and 40 and rest of the 10 participants were between 60 and 75. They were given 1.75 cups of fresh blueberries per day, along with their regular meal and were asked to avoid food rich in polyphenols and anthocyanins. Also, serum was obtained from every participant on a daily basis.

The findings after 6 weeks showed a positive result on the muscles of the women aged between 25 and 40. However, there was no such effect on women aged 60-75.

“Currently, research on dietary interventions to support skeletal muscle regeneration in humans is limited. This preliminary study of muscle progenitor cell function paves the way for future studies to develop clinical interventions,” said Anna Thalacker-Mercer, Ph.D., the study’s lead investigator, as per a report in ANI.

“While the results cannot be generalised to all populations, this study is an important step in translating findings from cell culture and rodent studies to a potential dietary therapy for improving muscle regeneration after injury and during the ageing process,” she added.