It would seem that the old wives' tale "an apple a day keeps the doctor away" has borne fruit again in that a new study suggests that apples, bananas and oranges protect against neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer's.

The study is published in the early online issue of the Journal of Food Science and was conducted by scientists based at Cornell University, Geneva, New York, and colleagues from several universities in Korea, including Gyeongsang National University, Kyung Hee University and Korea University in Seoul.

The most common fruits in both Western and Eastern diets are apples, bananas, and oranges, offering an important source of vitamins, minerals, and fibre, wrote the researchers.

In their study, they exposed PC12 cells, that are very similar to neurons, to phenolics extracted from the three fruits and then put the cells under oxidative stress using H2O2 (hydrogen peroxide).

The PC12 cells were bred using a mix of horse serum and fetal bovine serum. They extracted the fruit phenolics using ultrasound on dried fruit samples in an aqueous methanol solution.

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