London, Aug 1 - Scientists have unravelled a mystery about how resveratrol, a component in red wine, is effective against deadly inflammatory diseases.

New research not only explains resveratrol's punch on inflammation, but also shows how it -- or a derivative -- can be used to treat potentially deadly inflammatory diseases, such as appendicitis, peritonitis and systemic sepsis.

'Strong acute inflammatory diseases such as sepsis (presence of pus-forming bacteria or their toxins in the blood or tissues) are very difficult to treat and many die every day due to lack of treatment,' said Alirio Melendez, senior lecturer in medicine at the Glasgow Biomedical Research Centre, Scotland.

'Moreover, many survivors of sepsis develop a very low quality of life due to the damage that inflammation causes to several internal organs. The ultimate goal of our study was to identify a potential novel therapy to help in the treatment of strong acute inflammatory diseases.'

In this study, researchers administered an inflammatory agent to two groups of mice.