Compounds in the suprfood broccoli lower risk of cancer, heart disease and diabetes
- Flavonoids found within broccoli could aid body’s response to diseases
- Consuming phenolic compounds help to improve human immune system
- Eating the vegetable just once every three days provides health benefits
- Scientists one step closer to creating other foods with mega-doses
Stephen Matthews For Mailonline
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Eating broccoli could lower your risk of having coronary heart disease, Type 2 diabetes and several types of cancer, a new study suggests.
Flavonoids found within the ‘superfood’ could aid the body’s response to diseases, scientists claim.
Just consuming the vegetable once every three days could improve the immune system by aiding inflammation.
And scientists believe they are now one-step closer to creating other vegetables such as kale and cabbage with mega-doses of phenolic compounds.
Consuming the vegetable once every three days could improve the immune system, scientists claim
Geneticist Dr Jack Juvik from the University of Illinois said: ‘Phenolic compounds have good antioxidant activity, and there is increasing evidence that this activity affects biochemical pathways affiliated with inflammation in mammals.
‘We need inflammation because it’s a response to disease or damage, but it’s also associated with initiation of a number of degenerative diseases.
‘People whose diets consist of a certain level of these compounds will have a lesser risk of contracting these diseases.’
Researchers bred two broccoli lines and measured the total phenolic content and its ability to overcome oxygen cells in experiments in the off-spring.
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They then searched for the genes involved in generating the compounds in the most promising vegetable.
By identifying the genes involved in creating the compounds, researchers believe they are one-step closer to breeding other super vegetables such as kale and cabbage with mega-doses.
Dr Juvik said: ‘It’s going to take awhile. This work is a step in that direction, but is not the final answer.
‘We plan to take the candidate genes we identified here and use them in a breeding program to improve the health benefits of these vegetables.
‘Meanwhile, we’ll have to make sure yield, appearance, and taste are maintained as well.’
Scientists believe they are now one-step closer to creating other vegetables such as kale and cabbage with mega-doses of phenolic compounds which lower risk of heart disease, Type 2 diabetes and cancer (file photo)
Phenolic compounds are flavourless and stable, meaning the vegetables can be cooked without losing any health benefits.
Once consumed, the compounds are absorbed into the body and sent to certain areas of the body or concentrated in the liver.
Flavonoids spread through the bloodstream and reduce inflammation through their antioxidant activity.
Humans can’t produce their own phenolic compounds, meaning we have to rely on our diets for the health benefits.
Dr Juvik added: ‘These are things we can’t make ourselves, so we have to get them from our diets.
‘The compounds don’t stick around forever, so we need to eat broccoli or some other Brassica vegetable every three or four days to lower the risk of cancers and other degenerative diseases.’
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