Something interesting: according to Ohio State University's new study, keeping food visible in the home environment, outside of the kitchen, could be contributing to obesity. According to the lead author Emery, "The amount of food in the homes was similar, but in the homes of obese individuals, food was distributed in more locations outside the kitchen." There are obviously many factors relating to obesity, but doing simple things like keeping food inside the kitchen is a great start to psychologically crave food less. (Out of sight, out of mind?)
New research from Cleveland Clinic has found an awesome link between a plant-based diet and a reduction in heart disease risk. According to the study, "[o]bese children who begin a low-fat, plant-based vegan diet may lower their risk of heart disease through improvements in their weight, blood pressure, body mass index, cholesterol levels, [and] insulin sensitivity..." It is important to note that the study had only 28 subjects and took place over the short time period of four weeks, though. Still, promising for future studies!
Hey, more news about vegetarian diets! According to a study from the JAMA Network Journals, a vegetarian diet helps reduce risk of colorectal cancers. There isn't enough to form a direct causation yet, but compared with nonvegetarians, vegetarians had a 22 percent lower risk for all colorectal cancers, 19 percent lower risk for colon cancer and 29 percent lower risk for rectal cancer.
The Endocrine Society has found that breaking the soda habit may be due to more than yummy taste; sugar literally suppresses the hormone cortisol and stress responses in the brain.The study took women and divided them among a sugar beverage-drinking group and an artificial sugar beverage-drinking group. Those who drank the sugar drinks had decreased stress activity in the hippocampus, while those drinking the "diet" ones did not.
In the first study to look at prenatal nutrition and genome-wide DNA patterns in adults exposed to severe under-nutrition at different periods of gestation, researchers at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health have found that the first ten weeks of pregnancy are incredibly important in terms of food intake. Children of mothers who had less than 900 calories a day during the Dutch Hunger Winter of 1944-1945 were tracked down, and blood samples were taken from them. The now-59-year-olds had supression of genes involved in growth, development, and metabolism.
On the opposite side of that spectrum, maternal obesity is being linked to decrease immune protection in babies. University of California - Riverside, took blood samples of umbilical cords in mothers of varying BMIs (which they classified into average, overweight, and obese) to look at infant immune cells. The immune cells of children born to mothers classified as obese did not respond as well to antigens (foreign invaders). Let's take this with a note of caution, though, since BMI is being increasingly criticized as a health measure.
The above study also falls in line with one done by University of Adelaide, and another done by Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology. I want to note that both of these are done on rats, but that the information is nonetheless intriguing. University of Adelaide found that mothers can reduce the chance of their child being addicted to junk food if they push healthy foods for themselves in late pregnancy and push healthy eating for both themselves and the child during the child's adolescence. The American Societies for Experimental Biology had earlier found that eating junk food during pregnancy causes developmental changes of the opioid signaling pathway in the brains of unborn children. This means that the children have less of a response to the "feel good" hormones released when eating junk food, and are spurred to eat more of it.
According to the British Journal of Sports Medicine, just thirty minutes of any intensity of physical activity six days a week is linked to a 40% lower risk of death from any cause among elderly men. The sample was large-- 15,000 men born in 1923 to 1932-- so it looks pretty promising. Just another reason to keep moving, particularly as you age!
The benefits of protein in controlling hunger have been decently well-documented, but a recent study by University of Missouri-Columbia in collaboration with colleagues at DuPont Nutrition & Health is helping parents to make smart choices about what types of protein to give their kids as snacks. Plant-based protein, like soy, came out as a really good option to reduce overall fat intake and increase healthy proteins.
Lund University in Sweden has looked at some benefits of high-fat dairy products. By studying 27,000 individuals between the ages of 45 and 74, the researchers found that consumption of high-fat yogurt and cheese reduced the risk of type 2 diabetes by as much as a fifth. High meat consumption, however, increased the risk of participants. The researchers acknowledge that other nutrients in the dairy products that are not found in meat could have contributed to the results.
More good news about dairy! The University of
Kansas Medical Center has found a correlation between milk consumption glutathione
in the brain. Glutathione is a naturally-occurring antioxidant, which could help protect against oxidative damage. Oxidation can contribute to diseases like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's in older adults, even those who are very healthy.
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