Ayyalusamy Ramamoorthy, professor of biophysics, University of Michigan, who conducted the study along with colleagues, pointed out that turmeric has been used for centuries in Indian folk medicine to treat wounds, infections and other health problems.
Although modern scientific research on the spice has burgeoned in recent years, scientists until now did not know exactly how curcumin works inside the body.
Using a high-tech instrument termed solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, scientists discovered that molecules of curcumin, a component of tumeric powder, act like a biochemical disciplinarian.
They insert themselves into cell membranes and make the membranes more stable and orderly in a way that increases cells' resistance to infection by disease-causing microbes, said a Michigan release.
Ramamoorthy did his Ph.D in chemistry from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, in 1990.
Their study on tumeric ingredient, curcumin, appeared in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, a weekly publication.
-IANS
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