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marylin monroe
Showing posts with label polyphenols. Show all posts
Showing posts with label polyphenols. Show all posts

"An Apple A Day" & More: Alex Leaf's Reviews Folk Wisdom and Scientific Evidence on a Forbiddenly Healthy Fruit Item

Forbidden fruit or not: You got to love your daily apples ;-)
Guestpost by Alex Leaf
An apple a day keeps the doctor away. I’m sure you’ve heard this before. And while there are many ways in which we could keep the doctor at bay with an apple (target practice anyone?), our wellbeing demands we eat the luscious fruit. Truthfully, the old adage could not be truer for a variety of reasons. So to keep things organized I am going to worm through the benefits of apples categorically. Also remember we are dealing with the apple fruit, not the apple fritter or apple flavored candy or the iPhone.

I suppose the best starting point is the apple’s nutritional worth. As you can see in the nutritional label to the right, a single medium apple is less than 100 Calories and provides over 10% of the RDA for fiber. Apples also contain every vitamin needed by the body with the exception of Vitamin B12, which is only found in animal products, and Vitamin D, which you can produce by eating your apple under the sun. The same applies to minerals, with apples providing a little of everything except selenium.

A hearty bite for a healthy heart

If you have ever looked at an apple you may have noticed it resembles the humble heart, and for good reason. A comprehensive review of nine human studies conducted by researchers at the British Nutrition Foundation in London examined the effects of apples on cardiovascular disease risk factors and found that apple polyphenols, a type of antioxidant, have a positive influence on blood lipids and blood pressure in human beings (Weichselbaum, Wyness and Stanner 2010). Furthermore, don’t think that apple juice has you covered, since these compounds are most concentrated in the peel of the apple (Wolfe, Wu and Liu 2003). In fact, whole apples have an average of 57 times more polyphenols than commercial apple juice (Hyson 2011; cf. Figure 1).
Figure 1: Phenols in whole apples vs. juices (Markowski. 2005)
Not for juicers (addendum by Adel)! I won't tire and repeat it once again. If you want to eat fruit, do so - EAT it, don't juice it, or buy juices from the supermarket. Why? Just take a  look at the phenol loss in juices in Figure 1 and you have your answer.

I know that some of you are juice-o-holoics, so in case you still insist on juicing, keep the pomace and throw away the juice, not the other way around ;-)
Okay, so heart health is from the antioxidants in apples and I can get those in any fruit or vegetable. Well, not quite. In one study of nonsmoking healthy middle-age adults who ate apples less than twice a month, simply eating one apple per day lowered blood levels of oxidized LDL – a substance linked to hardening of the arteries – by 40% (Ohio State University 2012). And it’s not just because of the polyphenols either, since a group in this study that took a polyphenol supplement instead of eating the apple had similar but not as pronounced effects. Even dried apples show promise, with a separate study concluding that daily dried apple consumption “can significantly lower atherogenic cholesterol levels” (Chai, et al. 2012). The only caveat is that you need to eat the equivalent of two apples per day if dried rather than fresh.

Apples can help with weight management and protect against cancer

In a very recent study, researchers from the University of Navarra in Spain sought to determine the mechanisms through which the beneficial effects of apple polyphenols act on diet-induced obesity (Boqué, et al. 2013). Overall, they found that apple polyphenols exerted potent anti-obesity and anti-diabetic effects through prevention of fat cell growth, decreased intestinal glucose uptake, and increased fat breakdown. These effects were observed at both the surface and genetic level. The researchers even conclude their study with the acknowledgement that apple polyphenols can act “as a promising functional food ingredient for the management of obesity and its metabolic complications”.
Figure 2: Vitamin & Mineral content of one large apple relative to RDA. Data based on USDA food database for 09003, Apples, raw, with skin (USDA. 2013) - left;  Nutritional label of one raw apple with skin - right (skipthepie.org. 2013)
A review summarizing the current knowledge on potential cancer preventive effects of apples conducted by a lone researcher at the German Cancer Research Center in Germany found that apples influence multiple mechanisms relevant for cancer prevention on the genetic level, and regular consumption of one (or more) apple per day has been shown to prevent skin, breast, and colon cancer (Gerhauser 2008). And it all comes back to the whole fruit, with some of the most potent anti-cancer compounds residing in the peel (Cornell University 2007).

Apples can do even more!

The antioxidants in apples have been shown to extend the average lifespan of fruit flies by 10% (American Chemical Society 2011). Granted the relevance to humans is debatable, but it’s interesting nonetheless. Apple polyphenols may even provide protection against some autoimmune diseases such as ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease (Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology 2011). Another unique compound found in apple peels, ursolic acid, prevents muscle loss during illness and aging, and “animals given ursolic acid also became leaner and had lower blood levels of glucose, cholesterol and triglycerides” (Cell Press 2011).

And it doesn’t end there. In a review and analysis of apples and related compounds, Dianne Hyson (Hyson 2011) from the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences, California State University concluded that, There are current data suggesting that [apple polyphenols] might be linked to reduced risk of several forms of cancer, cardiovascular disease, and asthma. [Apple polyphenols] may also have beneficial effects on outcomes related to Alzheimer’s disease, cognitive decline of normal aging, diabetes, weight management, bone health, and gastrointestinal protection from drug injury.
Red Delicious is king, when it comes to its antioxidant power.
Talk about natural medicine! While everyone has their own apple preferences, some of us may want to know how to capitalize on this apple investment. If that’s the case, then I present the Red Delicious apple. Studying the antioxidant amounts of every apple variety would be difficult, but less broad comparisons have been done. One of these studies looked at eight popular apple varieties grown on the same farm under similar conditions and found that the Red Delicious had the most antioxidant activity (American Chemical Society 2005).
This makes sense when you think back to “eating the rainbow” in fruits and vegetables, since the above study also found the antioxidants to be five times higher in the skin than the flesh of the apples, and Red Delicious apples are renowned for their seductive red coating. It’s also better to go organic with this one as organic apples have on average higher antioxidant capacity than their conventional counterparts (Stracke, et al. 2009). So if you ever needed more reasoning for heading down to farmer Joe…
Oh, and before I forget. Apples are harvested in the fall, which makes local organic difficult to find during other times of the year. Usually, a bunch of apples will be picked and stored through the winter until the next harvest. Fret not, since “long-term storage, both at refrigerator temperature and under controlled atmosphere conditions, was found not to influence flavonoid concentration or antioxidant activity” (van der Sluis, et al. 2001) of the apple.

Emotional Eating

Have your head in the clouds from choosing to eat that apple with lunch? I’m not surprised, given that recent research has shown that eating fruit and vegetables may promote emotional wellbeing (White, Horwath and Conner 2013). More specifically, “on days when people ate more fruits and vegetables, they reported feeling calmer, happier and more energetic than they normally did" (IANS 2013). Even just eating apples in everyday life has been shown to reduce hunger and elevate mood (Macht and Dettmer 2006). Eating more apples isn’t challenging either. Actually, it’s as simple as buying a new fruit bowl. People are more likely to eat apples when they are visible and easily accessible (Privitera and Creary 2012). So keep your fruits close, and your apples closer. Especially during stressful times, as you may find yourself a little less anxious (Hyson 2011).
Promise me! Never throw away the pomace, if you insist on juicing your apples, then keep the pomace in whatever the result may be. This is where all the good stuff is and this is what made the difference between a 5% reduction in type II diabetes risk for apple eaters and a 8% increase in type II diabetes risk for apple (and other) juice drinkers in a recent analysis of three prospective longitudinal cohort studies by Muraki et al. (2013).
Bottom line (by Adel): If you are not convinced of the benefits of apples (not Apple!), yet, you may want to have a parting look at a study that made a direct comparison between statins and apples with respect to their cardio- and stroke-protective effects in otherwise healthy adults over 50 years.

The results of the model the scientists fed with data from previous studies are quite astonishing: With a assumed compliance of 70% compliance in the "an apple a day" arm of the study, the scientists except a reduction in vascular mortality of 12%. Now, allegedly that's based on the estimate that this would be the necessary consequence of the "apple-induced" reduction in low density lipoprotein... but alas, it's better than the hilarious and obviously 100% irrelevant witch-hunt on apples and other "high fructose fruit items" *rofl* - I mean, I find it "lustig" (German word for "funny") that people believe that someone would develop diabetes & NAFLD from eating whole apples.
References:
  • American Chemical Society. Eating apples extends lifespan of test animals by 10 percent. March 8, 2011. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110302121702.htm (accessed May 13, 2013). 
  • —. Red Delicious, Northern Spy Apples Have Most Antioxidants, Chemists Find. May 23, 2005. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/05/050523234141.htm (accessed May 16, 2013). 
  • Boqué, Noemi, et al. "Prevention of diet-induced obesity by apple polyphenols in Wistar rats through regulation of adipocyte gene expression and DNA methylation patterns." Molecular Nutrition & Food Research, 2013: [ePub ahead of print].
  • Cell Press. Apple Ingredient Keeps Muscles Strong: Component of Apple Peels Found to Help Prevent Muscle Weakening in Mice. June 7, 2011. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110607131718.htm (accessed May 13, 2013).
  • Chai, S C, S Hooshmand, R L Saadat, M E Payton, K Brummel-Smith, and B H Arjmandi. "Daily apple versus dried plum: impact on cardiovascular disease risk factors in postmenopausal women." J Acad Nutr Diet 112, no. 8 (2012): 1158-1168.
  • Cornell University. An Apple Peel A Day Might Keep Cancer At Bay. June 3, 2007. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070601181005.htm (accessed May 13, 2013).
    Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology. Scientists discover anti-inflammatory polyphenols in apple peels. December 15, 2011. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/11/111130100455.htm (accessed May 13, 2013).
  • Gerhauser, Clarissa. "Cancer Chemopreventive Potential of Apples, Apple Juice, and Apple Components." Planta Medica 74, no. 13 (2008): 1608-1624.
  • Hyson, Dianne A. "A Comprehensive Review of Apples and Apple Components and Their Relationship to Human Health." Advances in Nutrition 2, no. 5 (2011): 408-420.
    IANS. Eating fruits, vegetables linked to emotional well being. January 30, 2013. http://cooks.ndtv.com/article/show/eating-fruits-vegetables-linked-to-emotional-well-being-321793 (accessed May 16, 2013).
  • Macht, M, and D Dettmer. "Everyday mood and emotions after eating a chocolate bar or an apple." Appetite 46, no. 3 (2006): 332-336. 
  • Markowski, J., W. Plocharski, and M. Mieszczakowska. "Effect of cultivar and processing on phenolics and antioxidant activity of apple products." I International Symposium on Human Health Effects of Fruits and Vegetables 744. 2005.
  • Muraki, Isao, et al. "Fruit consumption and risk of type 2 diabetes: results from three prospective longitudinal cohort studies." BMJ: British Medical Journal 347 (2013).
  • Nutritional Info: Raw Apple with skin. 2013. http://skipthepie.org/fruits-and-fruit-juices/apples-raw-with-skin/?weight=182 (accessed May 2, 2013). 
  • Ohio State University. An apple a day lowers level of blood chemical linked to hardening of the arteries, research suggests. October 2, 2012. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121002143220.htm (accessed May 13, 2013).
  • Privitera, G J, and H E Creary. "Proximity and Visibility of Fruits and Vegetables Influence Intake in a Kitchen Setting Among College Students." Environment and Behavior, 2012.
    Stracke, B A, C E Rüfer, F P Weibel, A Bub, and B Watzl. "Three-year comparison of the polyphenol contents and antioxidant capacities in organically and conventionally produced apples ( Malus domestica Bork. Cultivar 'Golden Delicious')." J Agric Food Chem 57, no. 11 (2009): 4598-4605.
  • U.S. Department of Agriculture. "USDA National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference, Release 26." 2013.
  • van der Sluis, A A, M Dekker, A de Jager, and W M Jongen. "Activity and concentration of polyphenolic antioxidants in apple: effect of cultivar, harvest year, and storage conditions." J Agric Food Chem 49, no. 8 (2001): 3606-3613. 
  • Weichselbaum, E, L Wyness, and S Stanner. "Apple polyphenols and cardiovascular disease – a review of the evidence." Nutrition Bulletin 35, no. 2 (2010): 92-101.
  • White, Bonnie A, Caroline C Horwath, and Tamlin S Conner. "Many apples a day keep the blues away – Daily experiences of negative and positive affect and food consumption in young adults." British Journal of Health Psychology, January 2013.
  • Wolfe, Kelly, Xianzhong Wu, and Rui Hai Liu. "Antioxidant Activity of Apple Peels." J. Agric. Food Chem 51, no. 3 (2003): 609-614.

Green Tea Extracts for Building Strength & Size and Losing Weight - Fact or Fraud? Or, Why It is Always Worth Taking a Look at the Data that Is NOT in the Abstract.

Image 1: If the watery green tea is healthy, then a potent extract must be even more healthy, right? This may well be just another instance of "supplementational idiocy"...
I know people love their Green Tea! After all, Camellia sinensis is one of the staples that has not yet been debunked as another hoax of the supplement of pharmaceutical industry - a real healthfood, right!? Well, you will probably be familiar with my skepticisms towards the notion that taking tons of the polyphenols you are "supposed" to get in relatively small quantities from 2-3 cups of green tea in supplemental form must necessarily be a good thing, just because epidemiological data suggests that people who consume green tea (for those who only now this stuff in capped form: Green tea is actually a beverage ;-) in moderation are overall healthier than people who abstain from drinking hot water extracts (=tea) from minimally oxidized (=green) Camellia sinensis leaves.
Did you miss my previous blogposts on the negative effects of high dose green tea extracts on testosterone levels and male fertility? If so, I suggest you read up on that one before adopting the (stupid) more-is-more principal and popping the whole box of green tea caps at once.
Two recent studies do confirm the notion that green tea, even as a supplement, may be a worthwile addition to your dietary (I suggest you drink the tea not use the supplement) or supplemental (if you cannot stand the taste of the brew) regimen. The first one comes from scientists from the University of Warsaw in Poland (Jówoko. 2011). In a small-scale study with 35 subjects, Ewa Jówoko and her co-workers investigated the effect of 1280mg of green tea polyphenols (from a standardized GTE supplement by Olimp Sports) had on the adaptational response to a standardized 4-week strength training regimen (cf. figure 1)
Figure 1: Summary of the study design - participant characteristics, training and supplementation regimen.
If you look at the summary of the study protocol in figure 1, you may notice that there are two factors which contribute to the real-world significance of the study. Firstly, the subjects followed a semi-standardized diet (90g protein; 270g carbs; 104g fat), because they had to eat at the University's cafeteria. Secondly, the training, as well as the supplementation protocol are similar to what a real beginner would be doing in the gym, when he strives to build lean muscle tissue. On the other hand, this also means that we will probably see different (I would bet even less pronounced) results in trained athletes / advanced strength trainees with an optimized diet and a highly sophisticated supplement regimen - so bare that in mind, when you interpret the following results.
Figure 2: Changes in back squat and bench press 1-RM max and repetition max after 4-weeks of strength training with and without GTE supplement (data calculated based on Jówoko. 2011).
It should not surprise you that 4 weeks of training led to increases in squat and bench press performance. The inter-group differences, as well as the increase in maximal repetition number on the bench, however, did not reach statistical significance. In other words, what we are seeing here are effects of the exercise regimen, independent of GTE supplementation.
Figure 3: Changes in blood pH, base excess and lacate subsequent to the initial (Term I) and post (Term II) muscular endurance and max strength tests (data calculated based on Jówoko. 2011).
Similarly, the changes in blood ph, base excess and lacate subsequent to the initial (Term I) and post (Term II) muscular endurance and max strength tests (cf. figure 3), were not statistically different between groups. But if you followed the SuppVersity news lately, you will already know that blood ph is the domain of plain baking soda... so why even bother with green tea in this regards? After all its not even supposed to be a H+ buffer, but a powerful anti-oxidant, so what we should see are decreased rates of oxidation...
Figure 4: Lipid hydroxyperoxides at rest, 5min and 24h after a strength and endurance test before and after the 4-week intervention (data based on Jówoko. 2011).
And in fact, if you take a very close look at the data in figure 3, you may be able to see (I highlighted the bar for you ;-) why the title of the study, "Green tea extract supplementation gives protection against exercise-induced oxidative damage in healthy men", is not totally off: The degree of lipid peroxidation at rest(!) remained constant (within statistical margin) in the GTE group, while it increased by +27% in the non-supplemented group. In view of the non-existent differences in terms of strength or endurance gains between the groups, it is yet very questionable whether this "protective" effect is worth the 16$ (based on the price of the original supplement used in the study that is only available in Europe) it would cost to mimic the supplementation regimen used in the study - especially for someone who does meet the dietary requirements for vitamin E, which is something the study participants with their cafeteria food didn't.

Scientific fraud in the name of marketing

The results of the second study, which investigated the effects of decaffeinated green tea extract (DGE: 2x530mg per day; 800mg catechins per day, total) on body weight changes in 69 overweight subjects (sedentary males, aged 40–69 years, with BMI > 28 and < 38 kg/m²) are similarly dazzling. In their abstract, A. L. Brown and his collegues from Unilever (do I have to say anything else) summarize the results of their 6-week placebo controlled cross-over study as follows (Brown. 2011):
Despite a similar increase in estimated energy intake during intervention period 1, body weight decreased by 0.64 (SD 2.2) kg and increased by 0.53 (SD 1.9) kg in the DGT and placebo groups, respectively (P< 0.025), suggesting a protective effect of green tea catechins on weight gain.
Does not sound earth shattering, but -0.6kg weight loss does at least appear to be more desirable than +0.53kg weight gain. But even if you do not have access to the full-text (as I do) and are thus able to debunk this as a blatant manipulation of the facts (which, by the way, is the result of selecting data from the more favorable 2 weeks of the 6-week study period), the standard-deviations of 2.2kg in the DGE and the 1.9kg in the placebo group should ring an alarm. If you do have the full-text, and take a closer look at table 3 (cf. excerpt)...
Table 1: Excerpt from table 3 in Brown, 2011
... you should start sensing fraud. After all, the table clearly states that the mean body weight loss over the whole study period was -0.038kg for the placebo and -0.327kg for the decaffeinated green tea group. If you now scroll a few pages down and read the last paragraph...
The authors are all employed by Unilever Research & Development, which is a division of Unilever plc, a company which has a significant commercial interest in tea. Unilever plc provided all funding for the study.
... it should become obvious that, even in the case of something as "innocent" as green tea, you better not believe everything you hear and read about "superfood" and respective extracts on the Internet. So, instead of buying decaffeinated capped bullshit from Unilever, you better go to your local grocery store, get yourself some quality green tea and make tea-time a relaxing part of your probably hectic daily routine ;-)

Pimp My Olive Oil! When Virgin is not Phenol-Rich Enough: The Pharmacokinetics of Phenol-Enriched Virgin Olive Oil.

Image 1:  "If we have not somehow pimped it, it can never be good enough!" appears to be one of the credos with which mankind approaches almost every health-remedy nature has provided for us. In the past this approach was not particularly healthy, though... is phenol-enriched olive oil going to be the exception to the rule?
Being the health-conscious person you obviously are (why else would you visit the SuppVersity ;-), chances are that olive oil, or, to be specific, extra virgin olive oil is one if not primary source of of mono- and polyunsaturated fats in your diet. But do you actually know why? I mean why olive oil? And why extra virgin? What? "Mediterranean diet", "high MUFA content", "lower incidence of coronary heart disease and cancer"? All right, you have done your homework on olive oil, but what about the "extra virgin"? The polyphenols, right. The phenolic content is in fact what distinguishes a "good" olive oil. The phenolic alcohols, the secoiridoid derivatives, the phenolic acids, the lignans and the flavonoids in concert have been reported to have anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-atherogenic and anti-carcineogenic properties and are probably as, if not more important for the beneficial health effects of the Mediterranean gold than its fatty acid profile (Covas. 2007; Covas. 2008).

So, if those polyphenols are the "active ingredients" in olive oil, wouldn't it be nice if we had an oil that had even more of these beneficial healthy secondary plant metabolits in our oils, right?

Now we have tons of polyphenols, but does that make a difference?

The thought, that a souped up version of the already phenol-rich virgin olive oil would be an even more potent health promoter must have occurred to a group of researcher from Spain, as well. Back in 2010 already, Manual Suárez and his coworkers published a paper in the Journal of Argiculture and Food Chemistry in which they describe the development of a "phenol-enriched olive oil with phenolic compounds from olive cake" (Suárez. 2010). In essence, the scientists just put back some of the pulp (an extract to be precise) that is produced when the oil is squeezed from the olives into the end-product. In a more recent study the scientists did now try to evaluate how much of these (additional) health promoters in 30ml of regular virgin olive oil (VO) and the enhanced virgin olive oil (EVOO) actually make it into the blood of 16 (8 men, 8 women) healthy subjects in a randomized, controlled, cross-over trial (Suárez. 2011).
Figure 1: Compositional differences (phenol-enriched vs. standard virgin olive oil) in polyphenol content (data calculated based on Suárez. 2011)
If you take a look at the compositional differences between the regular and the "phenol-enriched" virgin olive oil, it is quite obvious that, from a mere quantitative point of view, Suárez' product with on average 3.3x more secondary plant metabolits should be the more potent health promoter. After all, numerous previous studies have shown that those olive oils with (naturally!) particularly high phenol-content exhibit the most pronounced beneficial health effects (Samanego Sanchéz. 2007). This would yet require adequate absorption of the respective compounds from a now obviously more dense solution, which, according to the results of this study, does not seem to be the case for all compounds - and more importantly, all subjects:
The in vivo study showed that the concentration of fourteen of twenty-four compounds detected was higher in the plasma samples from the EVOO than after ingestion of VOO. Among these, two of them, hydroxytyrosol sulphate and vanil-lin sulphate, were statistically significant in attending their pharmacokinetic parameters, demonstrating the suitability of enrichment. In general, a displacement of the time to reach the maximum concentration is observed in the samples, which indicates that more time is needed to absorb the higher phenolic content. However, inter-individual variabilityin the concentration of the plasma phenol metabolites shows that it is difficult to show statistically significant differences between the VOO and the EVOO.
The scientists thusly conclude that the "metabolism of phenols is affected first by the individual". So until we actually know which influence these are, the label "phenol-enriched" on olive oils and other products has little meaning for you as an individual. And even if you belong to the "lucky" high-absorbers, only two, namely vanillin sulphate and hydroxytyrosol sulphate will reach what the scientists call "pharmocokinetic" levels, if you ingest two tablespoons of the super-potent "phenol-enriched" virgin (and still relatively natural) olive oil.
Figure 2: Changes in total antioxidant activity (TAA) of experimental oils subsequent to heat treatment (from Pellegrini. 2001)
Note: Common Internet wisdom would suggest that you have to be particularly cautious with those "phenol-enriched virgin olive oils", when respective products hit the market (and I bet this won't take long). After all, you will all have heard how heating those oils damages the healthy polyphenols - and while that may to some extend be the case, a 2001 study by Nicoletta Pellegrini et al. found that the total antioxidant value of olive oil does not only increase with increased polyphenol content, but that those polyphenols are also "stabilizers of R-tocopherol during olive oil heating, thus contributing to the nutritional value of cooked foods" and "the prevention of antioxidant activity decay in olive oil during realistic heating conditions" (Pellegrini. 2001), which ranged from 30min at 160°C to 120min at 190°C. The latter happens to be at the upper end of the regular deep-frying temperature and would thus suggest that the commonly heard recommendation not to use extra virgin olive oil for frying is not valid, at least when we focus exclusively on its total antioxidant capacity as measured by Trolox essays (cf. figure 2). In that it should be mentioned that, with its relatively high content of highly oxidizable omega-6 fats, olive oil still isn't the "ideal" frying oil - notwithstanding that frying does not constitute the healthiest way of preparing your food anyways ;-)
And though a recent study has shown that the latter conjugates with LDL and thusly protects it from oxidative damage (González-Santiago. 2010), it remains to be verified whether the consumer variety of the olive oil in this study will actually provide any health benefits. And this is particularly true in view of the fact that the food giants will, as they already do it in the case of "normal" virgin olive oil, minuscule amounts this probably expensive ingredient into their otherwise unhealthy convenient products, just to be able to put the highly marketable "contains phenol-enriched virgin olive oil" on the label... but, hey! I guess, this is just the never-ending story of complete nutritional idiocy ;-)

Broccoli No Superfood? Female Orgasm, What's It Good For? Can Piperine Make You Lean? Skinfold Thickness, An Exact Indicator of Insulin Sensitivity? Exercise, Cortisol, BDNF, Fatigue, IGF, Pollution, NOPE, EGCG & More!

Alberto Contador almost certainly wouldn't benefit from the use of a nitrate supplement.
17 seconds and 5 watts! Those are the SuppVersity figures of the week and the performance "increases" which were associated with the consumption of either 0.5 L nitrate-boosting beetroot (BR) juice over a 0.5 L placebo (PLA) drink with blackcurrant juice during time trials and repeated maximal sprints, respectively, in 10 male elite cyclists who are competing at the highest domestic level in a study that was conducted by P. M. Christensen, M. Nyberg and J. Bangsbo from the University of Copenhagen in Denmark (Christensen. 2012).

What does sound as if it could make the difference between victory and defeat, was however statistically non-significant and is further evidence of the fact that things that work in rookies are not necessarily advantageous for highly trained athletes (for nitrates benefits have been reported in untrained or recreationally active individuals by e.g. Bailey or Vanhatalo in 2010, and Lansley in 2011).

As a SuppVersity student the specificity of the ergogenic effects of dietary supplements is yet not really news for you, but I would hope at least some of the following items of today's installment of On Short Notice are...





Next to broccoli blueberries got an "unhonorable mention" in the Kingston University press release, as well.
Is broccoli really no superfood? Usually this is not the place to discuss mainstream popular science "articles", mostly because 99% of them are simple "copy and paste" jobs of press releases. However, since just that, i.e. copying and pasting is what all the major "science website" have been doing with a recently published press release from the Kingston University College in London about their smartest scientists "debunking" the myths about superfoods, I felt impelled to check what all the fuss was actually about.

Let's start with the most important message first: There is no such thing as a "superfood" which will ward off all diseases and make you live forever, as long as you simply eat as much as you can and then, when your tummy is ready to explode, top that off with respective extracts and related dietary supplements. So, in this regard, there is no debating that Dr Jones, Deputy Dean at the University's Faculty of Science, Engineering and Computing, is right: Broccoli is no superfood!  It stands to reason that the same goes for blueberries, acai berries, parsley, rosemary, sage, thyme and the bazillion of other items on an ever-growing list of superfoods, which, by one way or another, continuously fails to to enlist dairy, meat, eggs and all the other "bad" foods of which you could easily argue that they are likewise "superfoods".

Figure 2: Why do we need Caco 2 cells in the petri dish, when we do already have numerous studies on "superfoods" showing the actual rate of appearance of the purportedly active substances in the blood of both healthy human beings (top, cacao catechins; based on Hanlon. 2008) and rodents (bottom; for the purported anti-cancer molecule in sulforaphane from - you guessed it, the "unhonorable mention" from the press release, Broccoli; Mullen. 2009) after oral consumption? So, while the researchers criticism of the hilarious TEAC essays based on which snake oil vendors identify "superfood" after "superfood", may be right, their own approach appears likewise questionable and is by no means without alternatives.
It is also correct that the researchers observed in a previous study (Chohan. 2012) that raw, cooked and cooked + pre-digested parsley, rosemary, sage and thyme exert different (much more pronounced!) anti-inflammatory effects on peripheral blood lymphocytes (PBLs) and those Caco-2 cells, of which Dr. Opara, a colleague of Dr. Jones (likewise correctly) states:
"The Caco-2 is a single layer of cells grown in a laboratory environment that develops the characteristics and functions of the micro-villi, the tiny hair-like projections that aid efficient absorption found mainly in the small intestine.
[...] This allows us to look at what nutrients pass through into the body and could be used to test food supplements, drugs and foodstuffs. We found that while some compounds may have a local effect in the gut itself, in terms of the rest of the body the impact could be negligible." (Kingston. 2012)
What does yet not appear to be either logical or correct is the assumption that the absence of anti-inflammatory effects in the Caco-2 cells implies that systemic benefits can be ruled out. What's downright unwarranted, however is the way in which the press release generalizes these findings in the absence of experimental evidence to all polyphenols and (even more) the potential beneficial effects of whole foods, of which I hope that you, as a regular SuppVersity reader have meanwhile understood that they go well beyond those of the  individual nutrients you can extract and fill into caps, powders, tablets or gels.

Moreover, this approach also neglects potential effects of metabolites of the polyphenols that are formed in the body’s tissues or by the colonic microflora (see Scalbert. 2000; Rechner. 2002), as well as the existing real (not cell-line, petri dish, in vitro) data on the bioavailability of many of the beneficial polyphenols, catechins, flavonoids & co from both, rodent and human studies (Manach. 2005). What on earth would be the benefit then of reviving an early 1980s technique that has been developed by the US cancer research institute, which will never be able to capture the complex interactions that are taking place during the digestion absorption and subsequent metabolism of these molecules?





Exercise, cortisol, stress, IGF-1, BDNF, depression and cognitive impairment Sounds pretty damn complicated, right? If you add one and two together, or, in this case, very recent studies from the University of Hong Kong, the Vrije Universiteit in Brussel (Belgium) and the University of Heidelberg in Germany, the picture that emerges is actually pretty straight forward.

Figure 1: The difference between acute (~7days) and chronic (>21days) stress (in form of exogenous cortisol) does also reflect in the voluntary running distance. The initial motivating / ergogenic effects of cortisol begin to show their ugly face after roughly 3 weeks, though and it is likely that a continuation of the study would have put the rodents in a state similar to what is commonly labeled as "chronic fatigue" (based on Yau. 2012)
In their study, the results of which have just been published in the October issue of Neuroscience, the Chinese researchers report that acute (5-days) exposure to stress (here in the form of daily cortisol injections) exerts beneficial effects on both, the expression of the brain-derived neurotropic factor, as well as corresponding improvements in spatial learning, without altered cell proliferation compared to vehicle treatment. Chronic exposure to cortisol for 28 days in a row, however, decreased circulating and hippocampal BDNF and IGF-1 levels and lead to significant reductions in spatial learning, which were ameliorated, when the rodents had free access to running wheels.

In that it's noteworthy that the distance the animals covered also reflects the diametrically opposed (i.e. empowering vs. draining) effects of stress with initially higher (acute cortisol phase) activity rates and a profound lack of drive towards the end of the 27day study period.

That said, it appears likely that the protective effects of exercise would also begin to wear off with longer periods of chronic stress exposure; a hypothesis, by the way, which should remind you of the last installments of the (Female) Athletes Triad Series and the "vicious circle of overtraining, overdieting and overstressing".

As sarcastic as it may sound (and actually is), China would be the ideal place to study the long- and short-term consequences of air pollution on brain and overall health from childhood to (premature?) death
Now lastly, the Belgian study by Bos et al. adds yet another factor to the BDNF <=> cognition <=> exercise equation that may not be relevant for rodents, but could provide another incentive for you to incorporate regular, yet not overly taxing exercise and physical activity in general into your everyday life: Air pollution!

It has already been established that healthy children and young adults who have been exposed to particle matter from polluted air, show deposits of ultra-fine particles (UFP) in the olfactory bulb neurons. These depositions are accompanied by neuroinflammation, the disruption of the blood–brain barrier (read more about the latter in the SuppVersity Facebook News), and an early accumulation of amyloid β42 and α-synuclein (Calderón-Garcidueñas. 2008 & 20012).

Similar associations between living in a polluted environment with high particle matter concentrations and cognitive decline have been reported by other scientists, as well (Chen and Schwartz. 2009; Ranft. 2009; Suglia. 2008). Now the novel result in Bos et al.'s experiment is that even under those conditions, exercise can increase the otherwise successively suppressed hippocampal expression of BDNF and thus antagonize, or at least ameliarate some of the negative effects of environmental pollution (Bos. 2012)

You have read about the somewhat questionable use of colostrum as a muscle building IGF-1 booster before, but intranasal IGF-1 as a means to treat depression? That's news, right?
To finally come full circle, we do now only have to link these negative effects of air pollution on BDNF, the counter-intuitive circle of stress, cognitive abilities, exercise, the (female) athlete triad, BDNF and air pollution with the high correlation of daily emergency department visits for depression and air pollution Szyskowicz et al. observed in 2009 (Szyszkowicz. 2009) and the recently proposed necessity of adequate IGF-1 levels (as you know those are rock bottom in people suffering from the athlete triad) for BDNF to be able to exert its antidepressive effects, properly, and their suggestion to simply bump those up, with intranasal IGF-I so that you would have a novel, "plausible and promising treatment option of depression" (Paslakis. 2012).





Figure 3: The effects 0.05% piperine had on the fatty acid metabolism and storage of the HFD group was so pronounced that they ended up with a better visceral fat / body weight ratio than their peers in the control group (Jwa. 2012)
Piperine will get you lean This does not simply rhyme, according to a very recent study from the Yonsei University in Seoul, it could also be true (Jwa. 2012). At least in the rodent study Jwa et al. conducted in order to check, whether their promising in-vitro data would translate from the petri dish into the "real world" of a rodent cage, the addtion of 0.05% piperine to the chow of mice that were kept on a hypercaloric high fat diet did not just "markedly decrease LXRα mRNA expression and its lipogenic target genes (i.e., SREBP1c, ChREBPα, FAS, and CD36)" (check out figure 1 for the real world consequences of these epigenetic changes), it also lead to statistically highly significant reductions in plasma insulin and glucose concentrations, while concomitantly increasing the insulin sensitivity of the rodents.
"In addition, piperine downregulated the expression of genes involved in ER stress, including GRP78, activating transcription factor 6, and eukaryotic translation initiation factor 2α, and upregulated GLUT2 translocation from the cytosol to the plasma membrane in the livers of PSD mice." (Jwa. 2012)
In conjunction with the aforementioned epigenetic reprogramming of genes that are involved in the oxidation (upregulated) and formation (downregulated) of lipids, piperine's modulatory effect on the liver X receptor α  (LXRα) expression does thus entail a bi-variate anti obesity / metabolic syndrome effect that counters both of the two hall-mark features of diet-induced metabolic derangements: high blood glucose levels and lipid accumulation.

That I would still like to see human data on the efficacy and safety of this approach is yet not the least related to previous research which suggests that piperine does not just mess around with the cytochrome P450 enzymatic cascade (among others with the enzyme that is also responsible to clear estrogen from the body), which is by the way also the most likely explanation that bioperine "improves the bioavailability" of all sorts of supplements - it simply hampers their metabolism and subsequent excretion (Najar. 2011)





In the minutes up to the orgasm "excitement" spreads in a chain reaction from the genital sensory cortex all over the brain (img whatsonxiamen)
Female orgasm? What's it good for, I mean "biologically" ;-) Probably some of you will have heard the SuppVersity Science News Round Up which broached the issue of anorgasmia (=inability to get an orgasm) in women. Now, while it is pretty much indisputable and straight forward that those women who are affected by this condition are missing out with respect to the literal climax of sexual intercourse, the potential biological consequences are actually less obvious.

In a recent article in The Science in Society Review, Claire Wilson points out that due to the complexity and the fact that it cannot be empirically measured, scientists have always been wondering, why the female orgasm even exists, "as its evolutionary significance is unclear compared with the male orgasm’s explicit connection to reproduction." Among the more prominent theories are among others:
  • the evolutionary / physiological "byproduct" theory
  • the socio(-evolutionary) "cryptic choice" theory and 
  • the (bio-)mechanistic "sperm upsuck" theory
From a mere mechanistic perspective, the latter, i.e. the proposal that the "uterine contractions may cause the cervix to lower into the seminal pool, resolving the obstacles against sperm transport posed by vaginal tenting" certainly appears to be most straight forward, as the actual orgasm is in fact accompanied by powerful striated muscles that surround the vagina producing rhythmic contractions in 0.8s intervals.

Video 1: Meg Ryan aka Sally in When Harry Meets Sally is not just an example of an evolutionary nonsensical orgasm. The popularity of the scene is also testimony of how exciting (all puns intended) the topic.
What's problematic about this theory is that according to Meston et al. some women report having experienced an orgasm when no contractions were observed (Meston. 2004). Moreover,
"non-genital stimulation, dreams, hypnosis, and even mental concentration have all been shown to produce orgasm in certain women, highlighting the critical role of the brain and psychology in female sexual response." (Wilson. 2012)
These observations would also speak against the "byproduct" theory according to which the female orgasm is just an unnecessary remnant or evolutionary "byproduct" of both sexes developing from the same embryological structure, much like how males develop nipples without any gender-specific need for them (Wallen. 2008).

In a way likewise of evolutionary (though more socially than biologically) origin is the "cryptic choice" theory, according which regards the "females’ greater difficulty in achieving orgasm" as an incentive "for taking multiple mates among pre-human ancestors" thus promoting the confusion over their offspring’s biological sires and consequently entrusting their care to the whole of the society (Thornhill. 1996). Others argue that unreliable orgasms may bond females to those males capable of eliciting
"Many 'cryptic choice' theorists furthermore believe that the inconspicuous nature of the female orgasm may aid in selecting which partners’ sperm make it to the egg. For instance, one study found that males’ body symmetry - a trait indicative of stable genes - predicted frequency of orgasm in their female partners." (Wilson. 2012)
"I think women rule the world and that no man has ever done anything that a woman either hasn't allowed him to do or encouraged him to do."
-Bob Dylan
Yet whatever the exact "reason" (if you can even talk about that in this context) of the female orgasm may be, in the end, it is just as Claire Wilson states: "The male sex drive may have played the major role in ensuring that future generations exist, female psychology may have had a major role in deciding what they are like." (Wilson. 2012) Why does that sound to me much like what Bob Dylan once said about the relation between men and women (see box on the right)?




Video 2: TAFE NSW video tutorial on how to measure the sub-scapular skinfold thickness. I guess it is obvious that you can hardly do that without the help of someone else ;-)
What skinfold thickness tells you about insulin resistance in adolescents was at the center of the statistical analysis O.Yaw Addo, Mark A. Pereira and John Hime ran on a subset of the cross-sectional data of 1496 adolescents (age 12.0–17.99y) from the US national health and nutrition examination survey (NHANES) cycles 2001–04.

According to their results, simply measuring the subscapular skinfold thickness (SF technique; see video 2 for how it's done) could provide an as reliable indicator of high risk of being / developing insulin resistance as an expensive X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) based body fat analysis (DTF technique):
"When the top quintiles of predicted HOMA-IR values from the SF and DTF models were
crosstabulated to identify adolescents at highest risk of insulin resistance, the exact agreement (efficiency) exceeded 92% in both sexes. Therefore, both in terms of estimating fatness-related contributions to measured HOMA and also in identifying those at most risk of insulin resistance, subscapular and triceps skinfold thickness compared well with DXA total body fat as estimators of insulin resistance in adolescents." (Addo. 2012)
While statistically non-significant, the skinfold method was even more precise than the DXA scans in view of it's prognostic value as a tool for estimating continuous HOMA IR with adiposity measures.
Compared to the group average, each 1 millimeter increase in subscapular skinfold thickness was associated with a ~1.5% increase in HOMA-IR in boys and girls.
Another interesting side-finding of the study was that after a transient rise during puberty the average HOMA-IR (by the way a measure of long-term blood sugar levels) returned to pre-pubescent in many of the adolescents. The effect was most pronounced in boys and showed a high interaction with the pubertal increase in body height.




NOPE + EGCG for practical diet help instead of overhyped fat burner!? I know that sticking to a diet and simply giving it time to do its magic does not sound half as sexy as taking the blue, red, yellow or whatever pill and shedding 4kg of pure fat within two weeks while you simply continue to eat the same junk that has made you obese in the first place, but the reality is - there is no such pill on the market and the one non-OTC "pill" I could think of that could do just that is toxic, has been used to produce ammunition in the first world war and will literally have you melt away.

NOPE, no idea what that is? The acronym stands for N- oleoyl- phophatidyl-ethanolamine, a naturally occurring phospholipid found in animal (fish) and vegetable (cereals, soy) food that is hydrolyzed into N-oleyl-ethanolamide (NOE) and phosphatidic acid when during the digestive process. The former of these, i.e. NOE has an inhibitory effect on the expression of the endocannbinoid anandamide (N- arachidonyl- ethanolamine). The latter leads to an increase in appetite and, consequently, an intake of food (Fu. 2003). In rats, an intra-peritoneal injection of NOE has been shown to promote an anorexic effect through the activation of several intestinal receptors, which signal the brain center to reduce food intake (Broccalli. 2005).
With N-oleoyl-phophatidyl-ethanolamine which occurs naturally in various animal and vegetable foods, and EGCG, of which I guess that all of you know that it stands for the unpronounceable green tea constiutent epigallocatechin gallate, Chemi Nutra, the manufacturer of PhosphoLean™ promises to have found a natural alternative that will help you by making it easier for you to stick to your diet.

And in fact, if we assume that the  40 mg of NOPE, 35 mg of EGCG and 25 mg of mixed phospholipids each serving of those pills contains, will have the same effect on you, as it had on the 50 healthy, but obese adults (35 female, 15 male; 32.7 ± 13.7 years; BMI = 33.4 ± 6.2; 43.2 ± 7.2% Body Fat), you will feel
  • more relaxed instead of more tense*,
  • happier instead of more depressed,
  • less angry instead of angrier,
  • much more vigorous instead of exhausted*, and
  • less confused instead of jazzed
while you are dieting. Unfortunately, those inter-group differences, which were evaluated by questionnaires were statistically significant only for those parameters I marked with an asterisk (*). Moreover, the purported psychological edge translated directly into a higher compliance, for the first four weeks only. It is therefore not very surprising that the overall changes in body composition in response to 8 weeks of -500 kcal or 30% (maximum of 1000 kcal) reduction in caloric intake and voluntary exercise (subjects were "encouraged to exercise 30 minutes per day, three times per week") were not significantly different.

The fact that there was a trend towards greater improvements in body composition in the placebo group, however, is surprising. So surprising, in fact, that it made me take a look at the funding of the study: "This study was supported by a grant from Chemi Nutra, White Bear Lake, MN" (Mangine. 2012) - must be coincidence that the researchers didn't mention this trend, right?





That's it for today, at least as far as the "On Short Notice" news here at the SuppVersity are concerned. If you want more, I suggest you take a closer look at the SuppVersity Facebook Wall, as well, where you will find (among a lot of other news) infobits on ...
  • a novel Anti-Alzheimer's drug that's based on a substance those of you who have been faithfully listening to Super Human Radio, even before the SuppVersity Science Round Up  was born will be familiar with, methylene blue,
  • even more on BDNF and its role in morphine addiction, including some insightful comments by Kamal Patal, the brain behind the PAINDatabase,
  • Pycnogenol(R) not delivering on all of the promises the producers of respective products are making, but does exert somewhat unexpected protective effects against hexavalent chromium induced spermatotoxicity, and lastly
  • CAD assisted insights into the endocrine side effects of the evil metabolic byproducts of bisphenol A and the association of BPA exposure with thyroid hormone abnormalities in mothers to be and their offspring
... as well as the handful of additional items I am probably going to post in the course of the next 24h before the third installment of the SuppVersity Athletes Triad Series will provide you with novel reading material ;-)


References:
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  • Bos I, De Boever P, Int Panis L, Sarre S, Meeusen R. Negative effects of ultrafine particle exposure during forced exercise on the expression of Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor in the hippocampus of rats. Neuroscience. 2012 Oct 25;223:131-9.
  • Broccali GBM, Pistolesi E, Cestaro B: N-oleoylphosphatidylethanolamine reduces food intake and body weight of dietary obese rats ameliorating their antioxidant status. Gazzeta Medica Italiana Archivo Per Le Scienze Mediche 2005, 164:101–107.
  • Calderón-Garcidueñas L, Solt AC, Henríquez-Roldán C, Torres-Jardón R, Nuse B, Herritt L, Villarreal-Calderón R, Osnaya N, Stone I, García R, Brooks DM, González-Maciel A, Reynoso-Robles R, Delgado-Chávez R, Reed W. Long-term air pollution exposure is associated with neuroinflammation, an altered innate immune response, disruption of the blood-brain barrier, ultrafine particulate deposition, and accumulation of amyloid beta-42 and alpha-synuclein in children and young adults. Toxicol Pathol. 2008 Feb;36(2):289-310.
  • Calderón-Garcidueñas L, Kavanaugh M, Block M, D'Angiulli A, Delgado-Chávez R, Torres-Jardón R, González-Maciel A, Reynoso-Robles R, Osnaya N, Villarreal-Calderon R, Guo R, Hua Z, Zhu H, Perry G, Diaz P. Neuroinflammation, hyperphosphorylated tau, diffuse amyloid plaques, and down-regulation of the cellular prion protein in air pollution exposed children and young adults. J Alzheimers Dis. 2012;28(1):93-107.
  • Chen JC, Schwartz J. Neurobehavioral effects of ambient air pollution on cognitive performance in US adults. Neurotoxicology. 2009 Mar;30(2):231-9. Epub 2008 Dec 30.
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  • Christensen PM, Nyberg M, Bangsbo J. Influence of nitrate supplementation on VO(2) kinetics and endurance of elite cyclists. Scand J Med Sci Sports. 2012 Oct 1.
  • Fu J, Gaetani S, Oveisi F, Lo Verme J, Serrano A, Rodriguez De Fonseca F, Rosengarth A, Luecke H, Di Giacomo B, Tarzia G, Piomelli D: Oleylethanolamide regulates feeding and body weight through activation of the nuclear receptor PPAR-alpha. Nature 2003, 425:90–93.
  • Hanlon N, Coldham N, Gielbert A, Kuhnert N, Sauer MJ, King LJ, Ioannides C. Absolute bioavailability and dose-dependent pharmacokinetic behaviour of dietary doses of the chemopreventive isothiocyanate sulforaphane in rat. Br J Nutr. 2008 Mar;99(3):559-64.
  • Jwa H, Choi Y, Park UH, Um SJ, Yoon SK, Park T. Piperine, an LXRα antagonist, protects against hepatic steatosis and improves insulin signaling in mice fed a high-fat diet. Biochem Pharmacol. 2012 Sep 20. pii: S0006-2952(12)00640-5.  
  • Kingston University London. Press Release: Researchers challenge super food claims. October 01, 2012 < http://www.kingston.ac.uk/pressoffice/news/461/01-10-2012-researchers-challenge-super-food-claims.html > last accessed on October 03, 2012.
  • Lansley KE, Winyard PG, Fulford J, Vanhatalo A, Bailey SJ, Blackwell JR, Dimenna FJ, Gilchrist M, Benjamin N, Jones AM. Dietary nitrate supplementation reduces the O2 cost of walking and running: a placebo-controlled study. J Appl Physiol 2011: 110: 591–600.
  • Manach C, Williamson G, Morand C, Scalbert A, Rémésy C. Bioavailability and bioefficacy of polyphenols in humans. I. Review of 97 bioavailability studies. Am J Clin Nutr. 2005 Jan;81(1 Suppl):230S-242S.
  • Mangine GT, Gonzalez AM, Wells AJ, McCormack WP, Fragala MS, Stout JR, Hoffman JR. The effect of a dietary supplement (N-oleyl-phosphatidyl-ethanolamine and epigallocatechin gallate) on dietary compliance and body fat loss in adults who are overweight: A double-blind, randomized control trial. Lipids Health Dis. 2012 Oct 4;11(1):127.
  • Meston CM, Levin RJ, Sipski ML, Hull EM, Heiman JR (2004). Women’s orgasm. Annual Review of Sex Research, 2004;15:173-257.
  • Mullen W, Borges G, Donovan JL, et al. Milk decreases urinary excretion but not plasma pharmacokinetics of cocoa flavan-3-ol metabolites in humans. Am J Clin Nutr. 2009; 89:1784–1791.
  • Najar IA, Sharma SC, Singh GD, Koul S, Gupta PN, Javed S, Johri RK. Involvement of P-glycoprotein and CYP 3A4 in the enhancement of etoposide bioavailability by a piperine analogue. Chem Biol Interact. 2011 Apr 25;190(2-3):84-90. 
  • Paslakis G, Blum WF, Deuschle M. Intranasal insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-I) as a plausible future treatment of depression. Med Hypotheses. 2012 Aug;79(2):222-5. Epub 2012 May 23.
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  • Wallen K, Lloyd, EA. Clitoral variability compared with penile variability supports nonadaptation of female orgasm. Evolution & Development, 2008;10(1):1-2.
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New Results From the "Test Tubers": Paleolithic Men Could Have Been Healthier Had They Microwaved Their Potatoes.

Image 1: Potato roasting caveman-style - probably not the best way to "cook" your potatoes
As a non-native-speaker, I must admit that the first time I heard someone talk about "tubers" was on Robb Wolf's famous podcast, back in the day, when I was "listener #6" (or seven ;-). Contrary to common (foreign) belief, not all Germans subsist on potatoes and sauerkraut and, what's more, even those who do, don't really care that a potato is a "tuber", i.e. a "Knolle" in German - I suppose the idea that it grows in the dirt is not too appealing to some, while the large majority probably just doesn't care as long as those "tubers" make a good addition to their Schweinebraten... yet, whatever the reasons may be, my first encounter with "tubers" has ingrained the link of these "underground structure[s] consisting of a solid thickened portion or outgrowth of a stem or rhizome, of a more or less rounded form, and bearing ‘eyes’ or buds from which new plants may arise" (OED.com), as the venerable Oxford English Dictionary would have it, to the paleo style of eating so deeply into my brain that I have been seeing cavemen with roasted sweet potatoes on their sticks in front of a fireplace in my mind's eye, ever since. Now, if that really was the way life went, back in the paleolithic days, our ancestors did probably miss about 32% of the antioxidant magic of the tuberous roots - at least this is what the results of a recent study on the effects of different cooking methods on polyphenols, pigments, and antioxidant activity in potato tubers from the San Luis Research Center at the Colorado State University  would suggest (Perla. 2011).

In their experiment, Venu Perla, David G. Holm, and Sastry S. Jayanty
  • boiled - 1h in a sieved double-boiler,
  • microwaved + cooked - 10min in a commercial microwave oven at max. highest level +10min boiling, and
  • baked  - 1h at 204°C in a commercial pre-heated oven
six months old stored potato tubers of 5 cultivars and 9 advanced selections of Colorado state (skin-color: 4x russet; 6x red; 1x white; 3x purple) and analyzed the samples for total phenolics, total flavonoids, total flavonols, and DPPH (2,2-Diphenyl-1-pikryl-hydrazyl) radical scavenging activity.
Figure 1: Loss in total polyphenol content of 5 cultivars and 9 advanced selections of Colorado state potato tubers due to cooking, microwaving, and baking (data calculated based on Perla. 2011).
As the data in figure 1 shows, all three preparation methods led to profound reductions of the potatos' total polyphenol counts. With Purple Majesty being most and Russet Nugget being least perceptible to the heat induced reduction in total polyphenol count. The cultivars CO97222-IR/R and CO97226-2R/R exhibited the highest total polyphenol counts (+77% and +137% above average in the raw state), with the former being particularly resistant to cooking (+119% above average) and the latter being particularly resistant to microwaving and baking (+154% and +169% above average, respectively).
Figure 1: Loss in polyphenol, flavenoid and flavenol content of 5 cultivars and 9 advanced selections of Colorado state potato tubers due to cooking, microwaving, and baking (data calculated based on Perla. 2011).
The superior resistance of these red-fleshed potato cultivars to cooking treatments is yet relative polyphenol-specific, due to their extraordinary high flavenoid and flavenol content in the raw state, CO97222-IR/R and CO97226-2R/R do yet retain a 241%, 155%, 199% and 243%, 331%, 395% higher flavenoid and 78%, 34%, 17% and 80%, 98%, 181% higher flavenol content  than the average potato (in the study) even after cooking, microwaving and baking, respectively.

The scientists also observed that, contrary to the white and yellow fleshed tubers, where the major pigment was lutein, the "dominant pigments in the red and purple fleshed tubers were anthocyanins", the antioxidant activity of which has been implicated in the prevention (by some even the treatment) of obesity, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, hyperlipidemia and even cancer. Unfortunately, these pigments are just as susceptible to cooking, microwaving and baking as the polyphenols, flavenoids and flavenols, so that the total anti-oxidant activity (as measured by DPPH free radical scavenging assays) of the tubers that were tested in this study was reduced by -26%, -32% and -38% by boiling, microwaving and baking, respectively.
Please note: While it is unlikely that you will die from eating a single raw potato. The solanine that can be found in all parts of the plant, including the leaves, fruit, and tubers, is a natural fungicide and pesticide the plant produces to protect itself from insects, the ingestion of which can potentially be fatal!
Now, despite the fact that microwaving is only slightly less damaging that baking, I assume that putting the potatos directly into the fire, like the paloelithic men and women in my daydreams use to do it, probably is the worst way to prepare your tubers. Yet while even microwaving would have been a healthier option, the best and, from an evolutionary perspective, more natural solution would be to boil your potatoes.

6x Bananas a Day!? Meta-Analysis: Lower Glucose, Insulin and HbA1c Levels From 'Catalytic' Dose of 36g Fructose

Figure 1: At least according to the USDA data, the average US citizen did never in the last 40 years get even close to the "catalytic" dose of fructose - at least not if we go by his / her daily HFCS consumption.
I usually don't start these articles with a disclaimer, but in this case I want to make sure that this post is not misinterpreted as a corn-refiners advertisement (and contrary to one of the authors of the Sievenpiper study, Coca Cola has unfortunately as of yet never covered my travel expenses ;-)... anyways, whenever the word "fructose" is used in the following lines it to the simple monosaccharide found as part of a complex nutrient matrix in many plants and their fruits (who would have expected that?). It is not used to denote the controversial results of a three-step enzymatic isolation process (Cornstarch → alpha-amylase → oligosaccharides + glucoamylase →  glucose + xylose isomerase →  42% fructose + 50–52% glucose + other sugar; cf. Wikipedia. "High Fructose Corn Syrup") that's at the heart of a very emotional debate about who would be to blame for the current obesity epidemic, now that the bad fats are no longer bad enough to be the scapegoat and ultima ratio for why we get fat.

Junk food is more than HFCS and fruit is more than fructose!

Fortunately, you, as a "whole food eating" SuppVersity reader, don't really have to care about the whole HFCS business. With your minimal intake of processed foods, your exposure to high fructose corn syrup should ideally be identical to the one of the parents and grandparents of America's obese children in the flower power seventies (~0.1-1g, see figure 1); a time, when your parents would not tell you to "beware of high fructose corn syrup", but to stay away from "those hairy, drug-addicted, reprobate hippies next door". Against that background, today's SuppVersity article is to be understood as an incentive to rethink, whether or not it is really necessary, let alone beneficial to deprive yourself of a whole class of vitamin and micronutrient-laden foods, simply because they contain a small number of molecules of which you are told that they "must not to be eaten, if you want to stay lean & healthy".

To help your thought process along, I have compiled the data from a recently published meta-analysis (that's a study, the results of which are based on data from multiple previous trials, which was weighed and compiled to come up with "new" data with a larger empirical foundation and thus greater significance). And I am honestly curious whether or not the evidence Sievenpiper and his colleagues presented in favor of the existence of a"catalytic dose" of  ≤36g/day of fructose that's been shown to improve, not compromise, blood glucose, insulin and HBA1C, when it is consumed instead of 36g of carbs from other sources (the studies in the review used either starches or simple sugars with almost identical beneficial results, by the way) will have catalytic effects on your opinion making process ;-)
Figure 2:  Effect of isoenergetic exchange of "catalytic" fructose doses (≤36g/d) for other carbohydrates (starches or simple sugars) on glycaemic endpoints: HbA1c, fasting blood glucose and fasting blood insulin, data calculated based on analysis of the scarce literature that is currently available (adapted from Sievenpiper. 2012)
The improvements in HbA1C, which is still the gold standard for evaluating long-term blood sugar level, in fasting blood glucose and insulin levels were across the board statistically significant, regardless of whether or not you apply the quality criteria, Sievenpiper and his colleagues used to weigh the results of the individual studies (cf. figure 2). Accordingly, the authors are right, when they point out that
[...] this small meta-analysis of controlled feeding trials supports earlier13C NMR spectroscopy investigations and acute feeding studies showing that ‘catalytic’ doses (≤36g/d) of fructose may improve glycaemic control [and that this] benefit is seen without the adverse cardiometabolic effects reported when fructose is fed at high doses or as excessenergy. (Sievenpiper. 2012)
Based on the data in figure 1, which clearly shows that the "average American" does not and never did pass this "catalytic threshold level" it may - at first sight appear odd that 42% of your countrymen and -women are supposed to be obese by the year 2030 (Hellmich. 2012)... at least for so long until you realize that for every American who follows your lead and consumes virtually no HFCS, there must be another one who consumes this person's 43.3g of HFCS on top of his own 43.3g of HFCS on a daily basis and would thus easily surpass the "scientifically proven" catalytic threshold levels which was (and I leave it up to you to decide whether this is coincidence or not) in none of the studies achieved from HFCS intake, by the way (I guess I don't have to tell you that my calculation is of mere illustrative nature, despite the fact that the 43.3g /day HFCS intake are actually from the USDA dataset for 2010).

Bad news for the guy who eats / drinks your daily share of 43.3g of high fructose corn syrup, ...

...but what does that mean for you? As long as your only significant fructose source are whole fruits and the few vegetables that contain more than trace amounts of fructose, you can answer this question by taking a look at the data in figure 3. The small figures on top of the bars will tell you how many 100g servings of apples, dates, pears or tomatoes you can consume until you hit the catalytic limit*uhuhhh...*: 3.9x 100g servings, of apples, for examples, or 5x 100g servings of bananas, or a whopping 32.7x 100g servings of lemons... sounds plenty? Well, I don't know, but certainly plenty enough to finally stop worrying when Adelfo Cerame would not ruin his health, let alone his physique, when he eats a banana along with his postworkout shake, wouldn't you agree?
Figure 3: Number of 100g servings of various common fruits to get to the more or less arbitrary  ≤36g/day threshold.
Notwithstanding, this ≤36g/day limit does certainly appears more or less arbitrary. This is all the more true in face of previous results by Livesey & Taylor, who could not find evidence that such a thing as a "threshold dosage" for the Hb1AC improving effects of fructose even exists (Livesey. 2008) or the fact that a "low-GI fruit intake [and not the number of servings of fiber-laden cereals!] was the strongest independent predictor of [lowered] HbA1c" in a 2011 6-months low-GI diet experiment by Jenkins et al. who compared Kellog's... ah, pardon me, I meant the medical orthodoxy's gold standard, the high-cereal fiber diet in 152 participants with type 2 diabetes with a simple low-GI diet (Jenkins. 2011).

Can ≤35g of fructose per day really be the answer to everything?

Though the main reason for the arbitrariness of the 36g limit certainly is the scarcity of valid experimental data from well-controlled human trials, Sievenpieper et al. claim that their reference for the "catalytic range" was in accordance with "an emerging literature" that "has shown that low-dose fructose (≤10g/meal) may benefit glycaemic control".

Now, those of you who have read my "Carbohydrate Shortage in Paleo Land" post from back in June 2011, will probably remember that from a mere physiological point of view every healthy (=nondiabetic and with an intact liver) human being, including the tiniest woman, should be able to handle a minimum of ~100g of carbohydrates on a daily basis. If we now take the 2:1 glucose to fructose ratio, of which Walliset al. found that it is just as effective in repleting muscle gylcogen stores after a workout as the same amount (90g) of pure glucose, and apply it to the 36g fructose threshold this yields a "total carbohydrate threshold" of 108g - coincidence or physiological necessity?

And even when you didn't replace some of the starches or other simple sugars for your daily dose of 2kg of apples (another example of exclusively illustrative nature), you would maybe get fatter, but according to the results of Silbernagel et al. not a single gram fatter than from the same amounts of calories from glucose from fructose or glucose conducted with healthy young men; cf. Silbernagel. 2011).

You can have another apple today and will still (or rather hence?) live tomorrow ;-)

Image 3 (edited in response to anon & JP, thx!): Certainly impressive what lifelong caloric restriction did to the 27.6 year-old ape on the right, if you take a look at his wrinkled age-mate on the left, no? Suggested read: "Health and Longevity Effects of Intermittent Fasting"
Overall it does therefore seem more than unlikely that a healthy, non-sedentary or even athletic individual has to worry about eating another apple, when he or she already reached their purported catalytic limit of 36g with the pound of blackberries, two bananas and a huge grapefruit this person could have eaten earlier in the day.

Moreover, skipping on the apple would also mean that you would miss out on its recently confirmed life-extending effects (+130% in yeast; Palermo. 2012), of which Vanessa Palermo and her colleagues from the Dept. of  Biology and Biotechnology “Charles Darwin” have shown that they are the prerogative of the whole fruit and not a result of the high antioxidant or polyphenol content of apples, as they occurred only, when the yeast is treated with a handcrafted extract that had approximately 26.7 g/100ml of fresh apple in it... and guess what, that apple, Golden Delicicious, happens to be one of my personal favorites, taste-wise, or course ;-)
Bottom line: I know it is more than questionable to which extend (1:20, 1:100, not at all?) the lastly cited life-prolonging effects of whole apples can be extrapolated to human beings, but that does neither diminish the perplexing results of Sivenpiper's meta-analysis nor long-established cancer protective effects of fruits in general and apples in particular (eg.  Veeriah. 2006;  McCann. 2007; Yoon, 2007; Gerhauser. 2008; Zessner. 2008; Jedrychowsk. 2009; Liu. 2010; Reagan-Shaw. 2010) and should therefore suffice to put more than a non-legible font-size "1" questionmark behind any previously taken decision of yours that it would be better to deprive yourself of these delicious superfoods (=fruits) than trust on your livers ability to to what she has evolved to do and turn the slow influx of relatively low amounts of fructose and glucose into energy and deliver the rest of the vitamins, polyphenols, and other micronutrients via the bloodstream to other organs.
References:
  • Gerhauser C. Cancer chemopreventive potential of apples, apple juice, and apple components. Planta Med. 2008 Oct;74(13):1608-24. Epub 2008 Oct 14. Review. 
  • Hellmich J. Obesity could affect 42% of Americans by 2030. USA TODAY. Aug 05, 2012 < http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/story/2012-05-07/obesity-projections-adults/54791430/1 > accessed Aug 07, 2012
  • Jandrain BJ, Pallikarakis N, Normand S, Pirnay F, Lacroix M, Mosora F, Pachiaudi C, Gautier JF, Scheen AJ, Riou JP, et al. Fructose utilization during exercise in men: rapid conversion of ingested fructose to circulating glucose. J Appl Physiol. 1993 May;74(5):2146-54.
  • Jedrychowski W, Maugeri U. An apple a day may hold colorectal cancer at bay: recent evidence from a case-control study. Rev Environ Health. 2009
  • Jenkins DJ, Srichaikul K, Kendall CW, Sievenpiper JL, Abdulnour S, Mirrahimi A, Meneses C, Nishi S, He X, Lee S, So YT, Esfahani A, Mitchell S, Parker TL, Vidgen E, Josse RG, Leiter LA. The relation of low glycaemic index fruit consumption to glycaemic control and risk factors for coronary heart disease in type 2 diabetes. Diabetologia. 2011 Feb;54(2):271-9. 
  • Livesey G, Taylor R. Fructose consumption and consequences for glycation, plasma triacylglycerol, and body weight: meta-analyses and meta-regression models of intervention studies. Am J Clin Nutr. 2008; 88, 1419–1437. 
  • Liu L, Li YH, Niu YB, Sun Y, Guo ZJ, Li Q, Li C, Feng J, Cao SS, Mei QB. An  apple oligogalactan prevents against inflammation and carcinogenesis by targeting LPS/TLR4/NF-κB pathway in a mouse model of colitis-associated colon cancer. Carcinogenesis. 2010 Oct;31(10):1822-32. 
  • McCann MJ, Gill CI, O' Brien G, Rao JR, McRoberts WC, Hughes P, McEntee R,  Rowland IR. Anti-cancer properties of phenolics from apple waste on colon carcinogenesis in vitro. Food Chem Toxicol. 2007 Jul;45(7):1224-30. 
  • Reagan-Shaw S, Eggert D, Mukhtar H, Ahmad N. Antiproliferative effects of apple peel extract against cancer cells. Nutr Cancer. 2010;62(4):517-24. 
  • Palermo V, Mattiv, F, Silvestri R, La  Regina G, Falcone CM. Oxidative Medicine and Cellular Longevity. 2012 [Article in press]
  • Sievenpiper JL, Chiavaroli L, de Souza RJ, Mirrahimi A, Cozma AI, Ha V, Wang DD, Yu ME, Carleton AJ, Beyene J, Di Buono M, Jenkins AL, Leiter LA, Wolever TM, Kendall CW, Jenkins DJ. 'Catalytic' doses of fructose may benefit glycaemic control without harming cardiometabolic risk factors: a small meta-analysis of randomised controlled feeding trials. Br J Nutr. 2012 Aug;108(3):418-23.
  • Silbernagel G, Machann J, Unmuth S, Schick F, Stefan N, Häring HU, Fritsche A.Effects of 4-week very-high-fructose/glucose diets on insulin sensitivity, visceral fat and intrahepatic lipids: an exploratory trial. Br J Nutr. 2011 Jul;106(1):79-86. 
  • Veeriah S, Kautenburger T, Habermann N, Sauer J, Dietrich H, Will F, Pool-Zobel BL. Apple flavonoids inhibit growth of HT29 human colon cancer cells and modulate expression of genes involved in the biotransformation of xenobiotics. Mol Carcinog. 2006 Mar;45(3):164-74. 
  • Wallis GA, Hulston CJ, Mann CH, Roper HP, Tipton KD, Jeukendrup AE. Postexercise muscle glycogen synthesis with combined glucose and fructose ingestion. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2008 Oct;40(10):1789-94.
  • Wikipedia contributors, "High-fructose corn syrup," Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, < http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=High-fructose_corn_syrup&oldid=505539604 > accessed August 7, 2012. 
  • Yoon H, Liu RH. Effect of selected phytochemicals and apple extracts on  NF-kappaB activation in human breast cancer MCF-7 cells. J Agric Food Chem. 2007  Apr 18;55(8):3167-73. Epub 2007 Mar 21.
  • Zessner H, Pan L, Will F, Klimo K, Knauft J, Niewöhner R, Hümmer W, Owen R,  Richling E, Frank N, Schreier P, Becker H, Gerhauser C. Fractionation of polyphenol-enriched apple juice extracts to identify constituents with cancer chemopreventive potential. Mol Nutr Food Res. 2008 Jun;52 Suppl 1:S28-44.