Watermelons lower abdominal fat accumulation and reduce heart-clogging arterial plaque

Photo credit: Naito8

Researchers from the University of Kentucky have demonstrated that consuming watermelon juice can have a significant impact on artery-clogging plaque deposition by modifying blood lipids and lowering dangerous belly fat accumulation.

Heart disease takes the lives of millions of unsuspecting individuals each year, and atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries), leading to a heart attack, is the most common form of the disease.

Many different species of melons have been shown to benefit human health and watermelon is no exception. Regular consumption of the red fruit can help manage fat deposition and weight management goals while lowering the risks associated with coronary artery plaque accumulation and heart disease.

Researchers using mice with diet-induced high cholesterol were given supplemental watermelon juice while a control group was fed a typical diet with plain water. After a study period of eight weeks, the animals given watermelon juice had lower body weight than the control group, due to decreased fat mass. They experienced no decrease in lean mass, an important finding: muscle tissue remained viable and weight loss was due to loss of abdominal body fat.


Watermelon Improves Lipid Profile and Fat Accumulation to Lower Heart Disease Risk
Further, the study authors determined that plasma cholesterol concentrations were significantly lower in the supplemented group, with modestly reduced intermediate and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol concentrations, as compared to the control group. An examination of plaque affected lesion areas found that the watermelon juice group experienced significant reductions in atherogenic plaque lesions and a statistically significant reduction in risk of progressive arterial hardening and heart attack.

Lead investigator, Dr. Sibu Saha concluded "Melons have many health benefits... this pilot study has found three interesting health benefits in mouse model of atherosclerosis. Our ultimate goal is to identify bioactive compounds that would improve human health". Any intervention that can stabilize or slow the growth of arterial plaque will result in a critical lowered risk of atherosclerosis (arterial hardening), the leading form of heart disease.

Like many other fruits and vegetables found in their natural form, watermelons contain powerful carotenoid antioxidant compounds that promote human health and fight disease. Watermelons derive their red color from lycopene, a nutrient well known for its ability to fight colon and prostate cancer. In addition, watermelon consumption is associated with protection against macular degeneration and has been shown to help lower blood pressure and improve insulin signaling. Prior studies have used three cups of watermelon juice or two and a half cups of fruit chunks to provide clinically significant levels of lycopene.

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Vitamin E tocotrienols protect the heart and prevent metabolic syndrome

Source: http://www.naturalnews.com/034140_watermelons_abdominal_fat.html#ixzz1dfAbj0om

Vitamin E tocotrienols protect the heart and prevent metabolic syndrome

Photo credit: Kittikun Atsawintarangkul

Few people pay attention to the importance of vitamin E, much less to the multi-fractioned mirror image versions of the vitamin known as isomers (consisting of tocotrienols and tocopherols).

Vitamin E has long been known as a nutrient that may play a role in maintaining heart health, but extensive new research explains that the vitamin in all its potent forms is required to dramatically lower the risk of heart disease and heart attack.

Recent studies also confirm that the nutrient family may play a crucial role in thwarting the effects of metabolic syndrome, precursor to the diabetes epidemic. Health-minded individuals may need to supplement with a full spectrum form of the vitamin to obtain the sufficient quantities needed to avert the multitude of chronic killer diseases that plaque millions today.

An ever expanding detailed body of evidence is mounting to support the importance of the tocotrienol fraction of vitamin E. While all eight isomers are required for optimal health and disease prevention, the four tocotrienols have emerged as critical components shown to influence LDL cholesterol particle size and oxidation rate. Researchers publishing the result of a study in the journal Molecular and Cellular Biochemistry explain that tocotrienols protect the heart against adverse gene signaling that is a consequence of elevated cholesterol.


Study Found Vitamin E Tocotrienols Lowered Damage to Heart Muscle by 75%A study was designed using rabbits placed on a high cholesterol diet for a period of 60 days. The test animals were supplemented with alpha, gamma, or delta tocotrienols for 30 days, and then subjected to experimentally induced heart attack.

Measures of serum cholesterol were cut in half in the rabbits on gamma tocotrienol and nearly in half on those receiving the alpha tocotrienol isomer. The delta tocotrienol form did not exert any effect on cholesterol. Additionally, gamma tocotrienol reduced damage to the heart by 77% and alpha tocotrienol resulted in 67% less damage to the critical heart muscle.

Metabolic syndrome is a group of symptoms closely associated with the development of diabetes. People exhibiting metabolic syndrome characteristics run more than twice the risk of developing cardiovascular disease and diabetes. Researchers from the University of Southern Queensland in Australia found "Tocotrienols improved lipid profiles and reduced atherosclerotic lesions, decreased blood glucose and glycated hemoglobin concentrations, normalized blood pressure, and inhibited adipogenesis."

Researchers determined that a variety of different receptors or genetic signaling mechanisms are involved that can prevent the dangerous systemic inflammation known to precipitate heart disease and diabetes.

Natural sources of vitamin E tocotrienols include most varieties of nuts and seeds as well as coconut oil in its unrefined state. Most people will want to ensure adequate intake of this critical nutritional fraction by including a full-spectrum supplement to improve heart health and prevent metabolic syndrome.

Related posts:

An egg a day raises risk of diabetes

Heart attacks hit smokers younger

Vitamin D-fortified yoghurt improves cholesterol levels in diabetics

Watermelons lower abdominal fat accumulation and reduce heart-clogging arterial plaque

Source: http://www.naturalnews.com/033922_vitamin_E_metabolic_syndrome.html#ixzz1bJlIwEd7

Heart attacks hit smokers younger

Smokers tend to suffer heart attacks years earlier than non-smokers, suggests a new study from Michigan.

"Individuals who smoke are much more likely to have a heart attack, and will present with a heart attack a decade or more earlier," said Dr. Gregg Fonarow, a cardiologist at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, who wasn't involved in the new study.

The findings, he said, also show that people who smoke "could have a heart attack in the absence of other risk factors."

Researchers led by Dr. Michael Howe from the University of Michigan Health System in Ann Arbor studied about 3,600 people who were hospitalised with a heart attack or unstable angina.

One-quarter of the patients were current smokers. And on average, they were younger with fewer health problems than non-smokers with heart trouble.

The mean ages at hospital admission were 64 for non-smoking men vs 55 for male smokers. For women, mean ages were 70 for non-smokers and 57 for smokers.

Smokers were less likely to have other health problems that are linked to cardiac risks, including high cholesterol, high blood pressure and diabetes.

That and their younger age explained why researchers also found that smokers were less likely to die in the six months following the index event than non-smokers.

That "smoker's paradox" -- the idea that smokers who have a heart attack have better outcomes, including a lower risk of death -- didn't last. The difference in death over the next six months was explained by age and other risk factors.

Dr. Fonarow said the findings are just one more example of the heart dangers posed by smoking, but emphasized that kicking the habit can erase those extra risks.

"Even within a few days of stopping smoking, there is a reduction in (heart) risk. As time goes by, within one to two years much of that risk is gone for heart attacks," he told Reuters Health. "From a coronary risk standpoint, there is an immediate benefit and that continues to extend over time."

The findings, published online September 15th in the American Journal of Cardiology, also showed that female smokers were more likely than male smokers to have other cardiac events in the first few months after the initial one.

"The real key messages are that smoking is a tremendous risk factor for having acute coronary events (earlier)... and that these risks may be even greater in women than in men," Dr. Fonarow said.


Source: http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/751289?sssdmh=dm1.725211&src=nldne