Antioxidants - some bare facts

As the low carb diet fad is wearing away, there is a new word that is becoming popular in the food world - Antioxidants... A search in google news might fetch a long list of studies and articles suggesting that intake of antioxidants can slow down aging, prevent or slow down cancer, prevent macular degeneration, prevent atherosclerosis and blah, blah, and blah...?!

So, what are these antioxidants ? And how true are these claims that it can prevent anything from aging to cancer to heart diseases ? and if so, what are the easiest ways to add these miracle components to our daily diet ?

What are Antioxidants ?
To understand Antioxidants, we need to first know about free radicals. Free radicals are the unstable atoms produced in our body as a result of the metabolic processes (during exercise, respiration where oxygen is "burnt" for energy) as well as due to exposure to tobacco smoke, some herbicides, radiation, sunlight(!) etc., These free radicals are highly reactive in nature, and so, they try to steal electrons from the neighboring atoms to become stable.

Sounds harmless ? Nope... Whenever these free radicals steal electrons from other atoms that are already stable, they will cause that atom to become a free radical and so this starts a chain reaction. And this is where antioxidants work their magic... they can donate electrons to the free radicals to stabilize them and still remain stable, thereby putting an end to the chain reaction - which otherwise can lead to damage in the cells, and the DNA...

(But then we have to also remember that, free radicals are all not totally villainous! Our body does use free radical damage for some beneficial purposes too - like for killing bacteria and digesting dead tissue or for removing harmful chemicals by the liver.)

What are the health benefits of Antioxidants ?
The best knowledge that we have now is that, higher intake of antioxidants corresponds to lower risk of cancer and heart diseases. But what is more interesting is that, there are also studies concluding that taking antioxidant supplementation can actually be detrimental to health and still, there is a controversy in using antioxidants as supplements for prevention or cure of specific diseases. Here are some of the conclusions from various studies:

• No study has found that increased intake of antioxidants through food, can be detrimental to health.
• Several studies investigating the antioxidant properties of red wine, have indicated that red wine does decrease the risk of heart diseases significantly even in cases of high fat intake!
• A meta-analysis done by cleveland clinic, concluded that vitamin E which is an antioxidant did not reduce the risk of a cardiovascular disease.
• Another study found that beta carotene supplementation for lung cancer patients actually increased the mortality rate, after which the study was discontinued.
• According to the National Cancer Institute, cancer prevention properties of antioxidants are not clear in people trials while lab and animal trials do indicate that they can prevent or slow down cancer.
• Studies on Lycopene (an antioxidant found in red fruits and vegetables like tomato), indicate that intake of lycopene in the form of tomatoes, reduced risk of cardio vascular diseases, cancer and macular degeneration. But still it is not conclusive enough to tell that whether Lycopene was the sole contributor or it might be due to other antioxidants in tomato like Vitamin C & Folate.
• Several studies investigating the antioxidant effects of Green Tea have indicated that increased intake of green tea can prevent cancer, can cure ulcer in rats, can help increase HDL etc.,
  

So my feeling is that though there are a lot of disagreeing studies regarding the effect of (mostly, individual) antioxidants on various diseases, one thing still remains unchallenged - that is, people with high intake of antioxidant rich food seem to be having a reduced risk of cancer and heart diseases.

How much Antioxidants do we need ?
Unfortunately, there seems to be no conclusive recommendation on the total amount of antioxidants that a person needs, to prevent or slow down diseases, and i think this is primarily because there are a number of antioxidants that can be utilized by our body, studies, so far seem to focus only on particular antioxidants...

But there are several studies recommending specific amounts of some antioxidant rich food like, 6 to 8 cups of green tea a day might help reduce the risk of cancer, or 2 to 3 drinks of red wine per week might reduce the risk of heart disease or 5 servings of antioxidant rich fruits and vegetables might be sufficient to reap the benefits of antioxidants etc.,

How can we add Antioxidants to our daily diet ?
Antioxidant content of foods is measured by ORAC units. In general, prunes, pomegranates and berries top the list of the best sources of antioxidants, though of late, a new type of berry from Asia called Wolfberry or Goji berry is gaining popularity (in spite of some doubts) and these berries are claimed to contain as much as ten times more antioxidants (25300 ORAC units) than blueberries (2400)!

And finally, here are some antioxidant rich food that we can easily add to our diet along with their ORAC levels...

• Eat purple or blue colored fruits and berries (mainly due to their Anthocyanins content) - they contain as much as 5 to 10 times more antioxidants than many other fruits and vegetables! Examples are blueberries (2400) , blackberries (2036), raspberries (1220), strawberries (1540), plums (949), red cabbage, purple egg plant (aka aubergine or brinjal), black currant, pomegranate(3307)), red grapes (739) and red wine...

• Eat foods rich in Vitamin C and E, both of which are antioxidants. (though supplementing vitamin E is not recommended by the UC Berkeley's wellness letter for lack of conclusive studies. A tidbit - Vitamin E was discovered here in UCB!

• Eat yellow, orange or red colored fruits and vegetables and green leafy vegetables that are rich in carotenoids like Beta Carotenes and Lycopene. Examples are the carrots (200), beets (1840), cantaloupes (250), mangoes, papaya, sweet potatoes (295), pumpkins, apricots, nectarines that are rich in beta carotenes, and spinach (1260), romaine lettuce, kale and broccoli (890), and lycopene rich fruits like tomatoes, watermelons (100), grapefruit and guava.

• Drink Green Tea - which has powerful antioxidants called polyphenols that are suggested to prevent cancer based on many population based studies.

And finally, a good news for those chocoholics! Cocoa and Dark Chocolates (13120!!) are found to have much much more antioxidants called flavanoids, than the blueberries (2400), green tea or red wine!!

Looking at the list above, you might realize that many of these fruits and vegetables are not only good sources of antioxidants but they might also be good sources of other vitamins, minerals and phytonutrients... So, as the doctors always say, there is no diet better than a well rounded diet consisting of different varieties of fruits and vegetables, that might just help us to,

"Live Long and Prosper"!