Friday, August 07, 2009

August Research Highlights

Journal of the American College Nutrition
  • Water soluble cinnamon compounds in the diet could reduce risk factors associated with diabetes and cardiovascular disease
  • Women with anembryonic pregnancies, when a fertilized egg attaches itself to the uterine wall, but the embryo does not develop, causing miscarriages, were associated with significantly lower levels of folate and ten other elements (including potassium), as well as high homocysteine levels.
  • Increasing your walking by 2000 steps daily reduces energy intake by 100 calories as well as promotes positive dietary and physical activity choices.

American Journal of Clinical Nutrition
  • Flaxseed significantly reduced circulating total and LDL-cholesterol concentrations, but the changes were dependent on the type of intervention, sex, and initial lipid profiles of the subjects. Further studies are needed to determine the efficiency of flaxseed on lipid profiles in men and premenopausal women and to explore its potential benefits on other cardiometabolic risk factors and prevention of cardiovascular disease.
  • Changes in dietary zinc intake affected DNA single-strand breaks. Zinc appears to be a critical factor for maintaining DNA integrity in humans (in this study, men).
  • Low total and animal protein intakes were inversely associated with blood pressure in Japanese adults.

Journal Nutrition
  • Findings demonstrate the usefulness of a novel stearate-enriched phytosterol ester compound in decreasing LDL cholesterol in both normo- and hypercholesterolemic adults.

Journal of the American Dietetic Association
  • Relaxation training supported by new technologies could be a useful tool for reducing emotional eating episodes and thereby reducing weight and obesity.

Journal of the American Medical Association
  • Under a wide range of circumstances, there are continuous, independent, and modest associations of Lipoprotein(a) concentration with risk of Congestive Heart Disease and stroke that appear exclusive to vascular outcomes.

Food & Chemical Toxicology
  • The antioxidant activity of vegetables subjected to minimal processing (in MAP, and intended for cooking or for use in salads), dehydrated condiments and ready-to-eat vegetables such as soups and purees, was assessed by reference to their ability to scavenge lipoperoxyl and hydroxyl radicals and Trolox-equivalent antioxidant capacity. In the case, the MAP vegetables were repeatedly measured during eight days of storage in a domestic refrigerator and after cooking (boiling, microwaving, pressure cooking, griddling, frying and baking). MAP vegetables had a good or very good antioxidant capacity, and showed no significant loss of antioxidant activity or scavenging capacity compared with fresh vegetables. The cooking treatments that keep the antioxidant activity of MAP vegetables are microwaving, sautéing and baking. The most aggressive method of cooking were steaming, boiling and frying. The dehydrated condiments (tablets) showed higher antioxidant activity than the ready-to-eat soup. The enrichment of stews and casseroles, with dehydrated vegetable tablets, and the consumption of soup or vegetable purees represent an increased antioxidant intake in our diet. Also “ready-to-eat” vegetable soups show antioxidant activity after they have been submitted to heat treatment to increase their shelf-life. They can be recommended as alternatives in our non-stop “life style”.

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