Dr. Oz Five Food Felons

---the other 200 posts---

Biofilms on intestine microvilli

The medical industry is slowly pulling away from diet advice that has contributed significantly to disease in America.  It promoted or at least tolerated, the shift from butter to margarine and polyunsaturated vegetable oils, and from saturated fats in meats to starches and grains.  The medical emissary, Dr. Oz, still supports medical advice that is not based on medical research.

Dr. Oz's Five Food Felons and Why His Choices Are Unhealthy:

"1) Trans fats raise lousy LDL cholesterol and triglyceride levels, lower your healthy HDL cholesterol level and fuel disease-triggering inflammation."  Trans fats are inflammatory and should not be eaten.  New labeling has permitted substantial amounts of trans fats to be added to processed foods and still be labelled "No trans fats."  LDL blood levels reflect inflammation, but artificially lowering the LDL with statins has no impact on heart disease.  Lowering LDL, by lowering inflammation with fish oil and/or repair of gut flora, diet and exercise is effective.

"2) Saturated fat in red meats, poultry skin, full-fat dairy products and palm and coconut oils fuels cancer risk, coronary artery disease, dementia, obesity and diabetes."  Linking saturated fats with heart disease, etc. was never supported by medical research.  Elimination of red meat, removing skin from chicken, avoiding egg yolks, etc. and replacing them with omega-6 polyunsatured vegetable oils has been a major contributor to inflammation and disease.  Full fat milk is the healthful choice, especially for children.  The change was dangerous and is being reversed with new emphasis placed on omega-3 fish oils.

"3) Added sugars and 4) sugar syrups cause the proteins in your body to be less functional and age your immune and cardiovascular systems and your joints. Plus, they disrupt your metabolism and contribute to almost every lifestyle-related malady, including some cancers."  Oz got this right even though they initially promoted high fructose corn syrup (half glucose/oligos) and its evil and even higher fructose sister agave nectar (all fructose/oligos.)  Equally bad, however, are the hyperglycemic starch in breads (including whole grain!) and over cooked pasta.

Gut flora

"5) Refined and processed grains don't contain the fiber or nutrients (contained in 100 percent whole grains) that you need to keep the bacteria in your guts happy, glucose levels regulated, immune system strong and digestion running smoothly."  Dr. Oz and company fail to understand the basics of vitamins, soluble fiber and gut flora.  Grains are not healthy for most people, because of the toxicity of gluten and hyperglycemic starch.  Ultra fine milling and fast commercial bread making eliminate the resistant starch.  "Whole grain" processed foods just add back the insoluble fiber that is considered toxic, because of its phytic acid content.  Grains should just be replaced with whole foods, such as vegetables that contain the soluble fiber that feeds the gut flora that provide all of the needed vitamins and are required for immune system development.

Why Does Dr. Oz Make Health Mistakes?

Dr. Oz has been criticized for promoting foods, supplements, medical treatments, etc. that are not supported by medical research.  While that is true, I think that he is just following the general views of the medical industry and simply doesn't know any better.  Sadly, most doctors don't have the background to read scientific research papers, let alone their own biomedical literature that is rife with scandals of nonreproducibility and inappropriate industry influence.  Doctors find it hard to give valid dietary advice, because nutritionists have false information and celebrity doctors, and their research teams, don't do their homework.  The result is the mix of ancient orthodoxy, industry promotion, alternative medicine and unscientific fads that appears in the media.  Doctors need a scientific background sufficient to answer the essential question posed to health claims, "Does it make sense?"

Health Diagrams III — Inflammation from Cell to Tissue

---All 200 Posts---

I have explained my perspective in diagrams of the relationship between diet, gut flora and disease:

Health Diagrams I — Gut Flora and Diet

and of the interaction between gut flora, the immune system and autoimmunity:

Health Diagrams II — Curing Autoimmunity and Allergies

Now I am discussing how inflammation, the foundation of most chronic diseases, begins at the cellular level and results in the classic symptoms of tissue inflammation: redness, heat, swelling and pain.

NF-kB is the Transcription Factor that Controls Inflammation Genes

Of the 23,000 human genes, about 1,000 on each of 23 chromosomes, five dozen, e.g. enzymes involved in nitric oxide (vasodilation and erection hormone), synthesis of heparin sulfate and prostaglandin synthesis from omega-6 fatty acids or cytokines (IL-1, IL-6, TNFa), are associated with inflammation.  These inflammatory genes are turned on or expressed in individual cells, when the inflammation transcription factor, NF-kB, is activated by any of numerous external signals, including inflammatory cytokines, bacterial or fungal cell wall materials (LPS or beta-glucan), advanced glycation end products (AGE, e.g. HgA1C, resulting from high blood sugar) or reactive oxygen species (ROS, e.g. super oxide, from insulin resistance).

NF-kB and Inflammation
Superoxid Causes Insulin Resistance

Inflammation is the Foundation of Growth, Birth, Cancer and Pain

We think of inflammation as the sum of physical symptoms, and our purpose in responding to inflammation is typically to limit its impact.  We try to stop swelling by applying cold or hot, and we take aspirin to lower fevers and stop pain.  We fail to realize that inflammation is essential to the growth and development of many different tissues, and that inflammation is a cycle that leads back to normal function.  

Body tissues, such as the lining of the intestines or the uterus, continually produce new cells to replace the old that are sloughed off.  NF-kB must be turned on for these growth and attrition cycles.  Taking aspirin blocks NF-kB in the gut and stops local development of the lining, resulting in weak areas that bleed.  That is why doctors encourage patients to drink a half glass of water before and after swallowing aspirin tablets. 

Another more dramatic example of control of inflammation is conception, gestation and birth.  Conception and gestation require inhibition of inflammation, to permit growth of a foreign organism (a fetus is half sperm genes) in the uterus.  Chronic inflammation limits the ability of the uterus to suppress immune attack and can produce infertility, which is treated by aspirin and heparin, which suppress chronic inflammation.  The return of inflammation at the end of gestation precipitates labor and birth.  Excess Inflammation produces high levels of circulating inflammatory cytokines, which causes postpartum depression.  Depression and chronic inflammation have the same cytokine profiles, i.e. depression is a symptom of chronic inflammation.

Birth and Inflammation

Proliferation, or enhanced cell division, is another aspect of inflammation and is also the foundation for cancer.  That is the reason that some doctors recommend low dose aspirin to reduce colon cancer.  Similarly, since inflammation is the basis for coronary artery disease, doctors sometimes recommend low dose aspirin, although this is controversial.  Doctors also use aspirin as a so called blood thinner, since it blocks inflammatory signaling in platelets and discourages clotting.  Inflammation of nerve cells is experienced by the brain as pain.  

When it is understood that inflammation is an essential feature of many normal, healthy cell and tissue functions, then “inflammation," with its negative connotations, becomes a misnomer.

NSAIDs Inhibit Inflammatory Prostaglandin Production

Aspirin directly inhibits NF-kB activation inside the cell, but it also chemically modifies COX, the enzyme that converts omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids (common in polyunsaturated vegetable oils) into inflammatory prostaglandins.  Other NSAIDS (Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs) just inhibit COX, but Aspirin transfers its acetyl group to make acetyl-COX, which has a new activity that converts omega-6 fatty acids into anti-inflammatory prostaglandins.  The high omega-6 fatty acid content of vegetable/seed oils, such as corn, soy, canola, etc. is why these oils, in contrast to olive oil or butter, are inflammatory.  Omega-3 fish oil is anti-inflammatory, because it is converted to anti-inflammatory prostaglandins.  Plant omega-3 fatty acids are shorter and are not converted to prostaglandins, but inhibit omega-6 conversion.

Aspirin

Nitric Oxide, Vasodilation and Viagra

Swelling is caused by vasodilation, the relaxation of blood vessels, and accumulation of serum in the tissue.  This vasodilation also makes the tissue red and warm from the increased amount of warm blood in the capillaries.  Vasodilation is caused by nitric oxide, NO, that is produced by an enzyme under the control of NF-kB, which takes the nitrogen from arginine (or nitroglycerine).  The NO diffuses easily and binds to receptors that produce an amplified signal, cyclic GMP, that relaxes the muscle cells surrounding blood vessels.  [Viagra is potentially dangerous, because it just exaggerates the amplified signal and obscures the underlying vascular damage, e.g. hypertension, that causes erectile dysfunction by blocking normal vasodilation.]

Nitric Oxide and Erectile Dysfunction

Hot/Cold and Endorphins

The dilemma of whether to use hot or cold therapy to block inflammation is based on a misunderstanding of what the temperature changes are actually doing.  Changing the temperature of the skin alters the structure of sensory proteins in nerves of the skin and triggers signals to the brain that register as hot or cold.  Chemicals, e.g. capsaicin or menthol, can have the same effect without changing skin temperature.  The important response for inflammation control, is return signals from the brain that release neurohormones, e.g. endorphins, from different nerves that reach not only some of the skin that was hot or cold, but also deeper tissue.  The endorphins block inflammation and all of its symptoms.  That is why chemically treated pads are more effective than icing or changing from hot to cold, because "hot" and "cold" signaling chemicals can be applied simultaneously.  None of the treatments is more than skin deep.  Actually chilling or heating tissue below the skin is damaging and causes more inflammation.  Low dose Naltrexone may be effective in some cases of chronic inflammation, by stimulating systemic rebound endorphin production.

Dr. Oz, Pain, Hot/Cold Receptors

Lymphocyte Offloading, Mast Cells, Heparin

Rosacea is a group of diseases that involve inflammation of the face in an exaggerated blush.  Any of the signals that would lead to blushing cause intense vasodilation.  A blush is fleeting, but rosacea is made chronic by another aspect of inflammation, offloading of lymphocytes.  Large numbers of lymphocytes accumulating in response to a local infection would produce pus.  In the case of rosacea, the distributed leucocytes, including neutrophils, respond to the blushing signals by producing inflammatory signals, such as P protein.  The result is cycles of inflammation, autoinflammation.

Mast cells can also be offloaded from blood vessels and provide a link between the immune system and inflammation.  Mast cells display IgE receptors on their surfaces, which bind antigens and trigger release of histamine, heparin and protease.  Histamine is a neurotransmitter that binds to receptors on blood vessels and nerve cells.  In the gut, histamine mediates many digestive processes.  Heparin released along with  histamine, coats the gut and prevents attachment of pathogens by competing for binding to the heparan sulfate proteoglycans (HSPGs) that form the surface of cells that line the gut.  [Heparin is the most common drug used in hospitals and is produced from intestines of cattle and hogs in the meat industry.]  Heparin also binds and inactivates the proteases released from mast cells.  Upon release, the now active proteases attack and activate receptors on nerves and immune cells.

Mast Cells and Heparin

Heparin is Anti-Inflammatory

Heparin is the most negatively charged polysaccharide, mediates most of the receptor/hormone interactions at cell surfaces; facilitates amyloid plaque formation, e.g. in Alzheimer's, atherosclerosis, diabetes, dementia; and controls numerous protease reactions in the complement system and clotting, etc.  There are hundreds of heparin-binding proteins.  Heparin is produced in secretory granules of mast cells by the action of heparanase on heparan sulfate proteoglycans. Heparin is a mixture of small fragments, oligosaccharides of heparan sulfate polysaccharides.  Heparin is anti-inflammatory and is administered to facilitate conception and gestation.  Inflammation also inhibits the genes involved in heparan sulfate proteoglycan production and since HSPGs are a major component of basement membranes of tissues and provide the barrier function of blood vessels in kidneys and brain, inflammation leads to proteinuria and loss of the blood brain barrier.  Since HSPGs have a short half life of six hours and are rapidly recycled, heparin added to the blood is rapidly absorbed by vessels, and heparin taken orally is absorbed by intestinal cells, but does not reach the blood.  HSPGs and heparin are central components of immunity and inflammation.

Heparin and Inflammation

Inflammation Blocks Skin Synthesis of Vitamin D from Cholesterol

Inflammation blocks solar synthesis of vitamin D in the skin and is more important than skin pigmentation, use of sunblock or latitude in producing vitamin D deficiency.  The vitamin D content of food is negligible compared to solar production in the skin.  It is not surprising that rising chronic inflammation is also accompanied by rising vitamin D deficiency.  Vitamin D supplementation is usually ineffective in curing vitamin D deficiency, because the supplements are too low and very high levels of supplemental vitamin D are required to reverse underlying chronic inflammation.  Statins are very effective at blocking cholesterol synthesis and although reducing cholesterol has minimal impact on the target, cardiovascular disease, it dramatically reduces vitamin D causing muscle pain, etc.

Most vitamins are enzyme cofactors synthesized by gut bacteria and used as quorum sensing signals during formation of biofilms.  Vitamin D, in contrast, is a steroid hormone and receptors for vitamin D are inside cells.  The receptor/vitamin D complex is transported into the nucleus where it acts as a transcription factor to control the expression of genes.  Vitamin D controls the expression of defensins in the crypts of the villi of the small intestines.  The antimicrobial activity of defensins is based on the basic amino acids (arginine and lysine) of its heparin binding domains.  Vitamin D also interacts with NF-kB in the nucleus and modulates inflammation.

Inflammation and Vitamin D

Bacteria and LPS

Lipopolysaccharide is a wall component that is indicative of bacteria, just as beta-glucan is indicative of fungi, and both are intense activators of NF-kB and inflammation.  LPS is released from damaged bacteria, e.g. by antibiotic treatment, binds to receptors on the surface of intestines and stimulates inflammation with release of NO, which produces diarrhea.  Food intolerances, which are based on incomplete digestion of food components, because of an incomplete gut flora (immunological responses/food allergies are rare) are probably also the result of LPS release from gut flora and inflammation.

Innate Immunity is also Triggered by LPS

The basic defenses of humans against microorganisms are mediated at the cellular level by triggering molecules common to all microorganisms, e.g. LPS for bacteria.  The responses are equally general: lysozyme to digest bacterial wall peptidylglycan, lactoferrin that binds iron and yields antibacterial peptides.  LPS (and inflammatory cytokines) also stimulates the liver to produce CRP (C Reactive Protein) that binds to choline on bacteria as the first step in phagocytosis and DNAse I that digests NETs (neutrophil extracellular traps) that are the DNA and histones released by triggered neutrophil cells that enmesh bacteria for engulfment by phagocytic cells.  [NETS plug peripheral catheters and can be cleared with probiotics that stimulate DNAse I release from the liver.]  NETs are also present at sites of inflammation and the accompanying nuclear proteins have the basic triplets that stimulate immune presentation and act as autoantigens, i. e. produce anti-nuclear antibodies, in the absence of adequate Tregs.

Diet and Inflammation

The diagram outlines the interactions that produce the tissue symptoms of inflammation.  Many components of modern diet can trigger inflammation:

Sugars and high glycemic starches raise blood sugar and enhance AGE/HgA1C.

Vegetable oils high in omega-6 oils are converted into inflammatory prostaglandins.

Wheat and other grains have high glycemic starch and insoluble fiber that is inflammatory.  Gluten is inflammatory.

Antibiotics damage the gut flora and produce vitamin deficiencies, autoimmunity and allergies.

Food intolerances result from damaged gut flora and produce gut inflammation.

Fish high in omega-3 EPA and DHA are anti-inflammatory.

The Anti-Inflammatory Diet

Health Results from a Balance of:

Diet (meat, fish, eggs, dairy, vegetables), containing macronutrients of protein, starch 30-100 g/d and fat (low omega 6/3 and saturated fat for most calories), and micronutrients

Soluble Fiber, e.g. resistant starch (consult Free the Animal), inulin, pectin, (plant polysaccharides, animal GAGs)

Gut Flora, diverse and adapted to dietary soluble fiber,

Exercise

Resistant Starch, Panacea, but Why?

Mark’s Daily Apple provides an authoritative diet guide (except for the gut flora).

Anti-inflammatory, Gluten-Free Diet for Celiac

Low Grain Is Good for Everyone

I don’t think that I have an intolerance for grain, i.e. a gluten sensitivity, but it is so common and the biochemistry is so obvious, that it is only prudent to avoid wheat and related grain products. A low or gluten-free diet is also similar to the other common healthy diets, e.g. low carb and anti-inflammatory.

Gluten-free diets came to my attention recently in two ways. First, I saw Food, Inc., a documentary movie about abuses by multinational food processors. After that movie, I felt like I was a goose being readied for foie gras. Second, was a newspaper article on the expense of a gluten-free diet and the challenges of avoiding gluten.

I haven’t had to worry about wheat contaminating my diet, but I am sympathetic to the celiacs that I know who have to labor with a sloppy and exploitative food industry that uses the cheapest ingredients to compose the processed foods that are consumed in modern diets -- processed foods are complex blends of many different potential allergens from innumerable sources throughout the world.

A Celiac Diet Is Good for All
Fortunately, the answer to pervasive gluten is just a modest modification of the basic anti-inflammatory diet that I recommend on this blog. Unfortunately, people who have already developed gluten intolerance, have probably had the problem for years before diagnosis and that means that their intestines have already suffered major physiological alterations and they have problems absorbing nutrients and vitamins. Celiacs also, because of their chronic inflammation and autoimmunity, tend to readily develop food allergies and other autoimmune diseases. The recommended anti-inflammatory diet will help to avoid celiac, put celiacs into remission and avoid development of subsequent allergies and autoimmune diseases.

Vitamin D Is Usually Deficient (and a source of inflammation)
The basic anti-inflammatory diet starts with a return to optimal vitamin D with the use of an initial blood test, followed by high level supplements to reach a suitable level and then maintenance with D3 supplements of usually 2,000-5,000 IU per day. Depending on the D3 supplement, vitamin A will also need to be supplemented, because it interacts with vitamin D. Remember that sunshine is only effective in producing adequate vitamin D if you do not suffer from chronic inflammation. I would assume that all celiacs tend to be vitamin D deficient.

A Low Carb Diet Is Easier for Celiacs
The next component of the basic diet is low carbohydrates, that means a minimum of high glycemic foods, which means to avoid sugar and starch, do not cook vegetables more than necessary and don’t over-chew your veggies. This is good for celiacs, because it reduces the need for common grain foods that no one should eat: bread, cereal, pasta, etc. Everyone should lower their consumption of these wheat products in solidarity for celiacs and for general good health. Cereal is a very bad idea for children!

Most Vegetable Oils Are Unhealthy
Most vegetable oils contribute substantially to world-wide inflammation and celiacs don’t need the added burden of inflammatory omega-6 vegetable oils. Only olive oil and butter should be used. Saturated fats are safer than typical polyunsaturated vegetable oils.

Eat Wild Fish or Tons of Fresh Flax
Most people eat too little omega-3 long chain fatty acids, since these are most abundant in fatty fish, such as wild salmon (farmed fish are fed corn and have reduced omega-3 and increased omega-6 fats.) Few vegetable sources are available, since the omega-3 fatty acids are unstable and present in leaves rather than seeds. Flax seeds have short chain omega-3 fatty acids and must be freshly ground and consumed by the cupful, because the conversion to the long chains, in which they are useful, is very inefficient. Most celiacs will need to use fish oil (or krill oil, if fish is not tolerated) supplements (4-8 EPA/DHA capsule per day taken in a meal rich in fats for bile uptake) to balance the ubiquitous inflammatory omega-6 in their diets.

Grassfed Meat/Eggs Are Your Friends
Celiacs should seek out grass/pasture fed meats, eggs and wild caught fish. Corn-fed animals have higher levels of omega-6 fats and these contribute to dietary inflammation. Celiacs can usually eat meat and fish and these are very healthy foods. Red meat was not shown to contribute to degenerative diseases, it was the high carbs eaten with the meat that produced the inflammation that contributed to heart disease. (Remember that statins only decrease cardiovascular disease because they inadvertently lower inflammation, not because they lower serum lipids, LDL.)

No, No’s: HFCS and trans fats
High fructose corn syrup and trans fats are inflammatory and unhealthy for anyone, and should be avoided as much as wheat gluten. Fruits should be eaten as seasoning, since their fructose is not healthy and they also contain ample sucrose.

Most People Would Be Healthier on a Celiac Diet
The anti-inflammatory diet proposed here for celiacs should be uniformly healthy, since it provides optimal vitamins (D, C, B12, etc.), low starch/sugar/carbs, an optimal omega-3 to -6 fatty acid ratio, increased meat and saturated fats, and avoids HFCS and trans fats. The only major adjustment for celiacs would be avoidance of individual food allergens, more attention to vitamin supplements to compensate for poor absorption and replacement of wheat by rice, potatoes, etc. The low carbohydrate nature of the diet makes it more approachable, since typical carbs, such as bread and cereal are avoided and replaced with meat and vegetables.

I look forward to advice and suggestions from readers who have experience with gluten-free diets.

Inflammation and Vitamin D Deficiency

Does Dietary Inflammation Reduce Skin Production of Vitamin D?

The media discovered the vitamin D deficiency pandemic last week. Amazingly researchers were recorded on camera saying that the D deficiencies are caused by insufficient exposure to ultraviolet in sunlight and inadequate consumption of vitamin D-laced milk. Have all of these people been avoiding the biomedical journals?

Have they noticed that my tan improved since I started eating anti-inflammatory?

Let’s shine some sunlight on these knowledge deficiencies:

• Serum vitamin D levels have been dropping (as chronic inflammation has been increasing) over the last three decades -- has something changed in our diets?
• Vitamin D deficiencies occur globally (not restricted to Northern latitudes or winter) -- related to diet?
• Women are more vulnerable, because of cultural modesty in some countries, but males are still D-deficient.
• A subset of people exposed to ample sunshine are still D-deficient.
• Vitamin D deficient individuals also have elevated TNF.
• Vitamin D deficiency and inflammation are risk factors in the same diseases.

It seems that the simplest conclusion is that chronic inflammation leads to vitamin D deficiency, even though vitamin D deficiency may also contribute to inflammation.

This also probably means that chronic inflammation makes it harder for skin to produce vitamin D during exposure to sunlight.

One would expect those who are inflamed to get sunburned more readily and people who eat plenty of omega-3 rich seafood probably produce more vitamin D, even if they are not in the sun as much.

Inflammatory starvation (or American fast food) diets high in starch and omega-6 vegetable oils, should produce vitamin D deficiency even on the Equator.

We should not be surprised that inflammatory degenerative diseases are associated with vitamin D deficiency. It would be interesting if vitamin D supplementation to eliminate deficiency, reduced inflammation and reversed degenerative disease.

Do statins reverse vitamin D deficiencies (and improve tanning) as they lower inflammation? [Statin lowering of LDL is unrelated to reduction in cardiovascular disease. Only the anti-inflammatory side-effect is important.]

Does NFkB activation (inflammatory signaling) inhibit vitamin D receptor activity and vice versa?

You can forget all of this confusion, if you just stick with an anti-inflammatory diet (that includes vitamin D supplements) and exercise frequently in the great outdoors.

Low Carbs Lower Triglycerides

Blood Triglycerides Depend on Diet Carbs, not Fats

I don’t know why the medical community keeps pushing the low fat diets to modify blood lipids. The medical literature shows that a low fat, high carbohydrate diet (more than 50 grams of starch/sugar in a meal) produces high triglycerides, and a low carb diet ( less than 50 grams per meal), regardless of saturated fats and meat, produces lower triglycerides.

In seems reasonable that fats in the diet should mean fats, triglycerides, in the blood, but that ain’t so. It’s the rise in blood insulin in response to a rise in blood sugar due to high glycemic index foods in a meal, that yields high blood triglycerides.

The low carb, low triglycerides facts of life were brought to may attention by my wife’s blood chemistry. She knows better, but refuses to follow my preacherly suggestions about an anti-inflammatory diet. She follows most of the use of supplements and prohibitions about vegetable oils, but loves carbs. She eats two thick slices of bread in a sandwich and I cut a thinner slice and eat mine open-faced. I can’t eat her pancakes or French toast. Ok, I eat lots of dark chocolate, but I don’t have flavored syrup in my lattes.

She was stressed by a high triglycerides (292 mg/dl) in her blood work and her doctor wanted to start her on meds. I was sympathetic. Not really. I actually said, “carbs, carbs, carbs,” until she threatened me. I nagged heavily to just junk the junk and wait on the meds. She started counting grams of carbs with each meal. Actually she tried to average over the whole day, I nagged, she finally relented and stuck to the plan. No more than 50 grams of carbs in any meal. (I think 30 grams, would actually be better.)

One month later, her blood work showed triglycerides down 57% to 127 mg/dl. Individual results may vary, but this is pretty straightforward. Carbs are important -- avoid them. The food pyramid is for chumps. The highest glycemic food you will encounter is a French baguette (95), compared to pastas in the 30s or table sugar at 70.

The facts are:

• Saturated fats in meat are no big deal, and much better than...
• Vegetable oils (most are rich in omega-6 oils, except olive oil) are inflammatory.
• Fish oil (omega-3 DHA/EPA) is anti-inflammatory (unless there is also too much vegetable oil.)
• Starch and sugar increase blood triglycerides and are only needed to gain or keep body fat. Losing weight is much easier without starch/sugar.
• Most people are deficient in vitamin D and C (even with plenty of solar exposure).
• High fructose corn syrup is ten times more damaging than starch/sugar, and is especially bad for diabetics. It doesn’t raise blood sugar as much as starch, it just causes damage, e.g. glycation, at an extraordinarily high rate. It also ages skin by accelerating cross-linking of collagen. Very bad stuff even in fruit juices.
• Eating plant anti-oxidants protects unsaturated fats as they pass through the oxidizing environment of the stomach, so nuts are better unroasted and eaten with veggies.

Diet, Nutrition and Health

These are my generalizations (some would say prejudices) from 40 years of experience in plant biochemistry and molecular biology:

Plant Secondary Compounds Are Defensive and Toxic

The development of plant secondary compounds (all of the compounds that are not part of metabolism or structures) is in response to pathogens, herbivores and pollinator/disseminator attractants -- development of these compounds has nothing to do with humans. Examples: Nicotine and caffeine are very toxic to herbivores and are present in plants for protection. Humans learn to play with toxic plant chemicals, just as they have learned to play with fire and explosives.

Plants Are Not There For Us

People have learned to exploit local plants for protection against local human pathogens, but there is no selective advantage to plants (except for domesticated plants) for useful plants to grow near humans. This logic would suggest that rats and mosquitoes, that flourish near human habitations, are there because of their human utility. Human live near places were useful plants grow.

Grains Are Unhealthy

One of the biggest problems with food processing is separating the inflammatory parts = starch and omega-6 oils, from the nutritive parts, the so-called anti-oxidants, vitamins, proteins, etc. Grains, even so-called whole grains, are simply too enriched for starch and inflammatory oils to be healthy. They are not safe to eat in large amounts. Leafy plant parts are healthy, but even those parts are not good in large amounts from a single plant species. Humans are browsers, because the plant secondary compounds are uniformly toxic, but can be tolerated better in a mixture of different toxicities.

Starch Is Inflammatory

Starchy foods should be treated like a fish. The starch should be pared away and discarded, like the fish gut and bones. (The guts and bones could actually be processed to make them nutritious. Not so with the starch. The starch should be fermented.) The potato skin should be eaten and the rest discarded, just as an aphid secretes as honey dew the extra sugar it sucks in from a plant leaf.

Cereals Are Inflammatory

Breakfast cereals are a dietary abomination. They contribute immensely to obesity, inflammation and chronic disease. Oatmeal for cardiovascular health is a total fraud. The fiber might be useful, but the high starch causes cardiovascular disease. Grains/cereal are the foundation of the chronic disease pyramid.

Fructose is Toxic

Fruit juices are another fraud. The juice (fructose) should be removed and discarded. The fructose is very unhealthy. Mice are given type II diabetes for research purposes by feeding them fructose (especially high fructose corn syrup.) Fructose is avoided in the beef industry, because it causes rapid cross-linking of collagen and leads to tough meat. The same thing happens in humans who eat fructose, it causes aging of the skin and other tissues. High fructose corn syrup is a commercial addiction -- it is hugely profitable as a sweetener -- and that is why it is still used, even though it is grossly unhealthy. It will eventually be removed from the market after the industry is protected from subsequent law suits. It is equivalent to the tobacco industry -- too lucrative to eliminate.

Phytic Acid

The active ingredient in fiber that provides its benefits is phytic acid, the same chemical that people are trying to eliminate. Phytic acid acts as a chelator. I don't think it is actually a problem. The problem comes from extracting cations from the phytic acid before it is eaten. Phytic acid should go in saturated, so that it doesn't contribute to deficiencies. The actual problem is that the diet is already low in minerals, because of eating processed foods that are mineral deficient.

Enzymatic Detoxification: P450, Glycosylation and Secretion

Humans are adapted to plant secondary metabolites by the abiltiy to enzymatically detoxify [using p450 and glycosylating (adding glucuronic acid)] and secrete the toxic compounds. These chemical modifications that occur in the intestines and liver are usually effect. They also work on drugs and that is how we eventually clear these compounds from our systems. Grapefruit and black pepper inactivate these enzymes and alter the way we metabolize plant toxins and drugs. The detox enzymes can also convert innocuous compounds into toxins and carcinogens. That conversion is the basis for using liver enzymes in the Ames Test for carcinogens. The activity of the enzymes is dependent on recent diet, so it would make sense to gradually change the amount and type of vegetables that are eaten in a meal to permit the detox system to adjust.

Glucose and Insulin Cause Fat Accumulation

Fat accumulation is dependent on dietary carbohydrates and insulin. Fat and serum lipids accumulates with a high carbohydrate diet and decrease on a low carbohydrate diet. This is more important than the number of calories consumed.

Inflammation Not Serum Lipids Cause CVD: Statin Are Unnecessary

Inflammation is the source of chronic degenerative diseases. Serum lipids are only secondary factors. Statins lower serum lipids, but do not impact cardiovascular health unless they also lower inflammation. Lowering inflammation lowers serum lipids and decreases cardiovascular disease. Statins appear to be a very expensive way of treating cardiovascular disease dependent on their side effect on inflammation. Modest dietary and lifestyle changes are much more effective, cheap and safe than statins.

Omega-3 Fatty Acids, Antioxidants and Cancer

It is hard to sort out the inflammatory effects of short/long-chain omega-6 and omega-3 fatty acids. Vegetable antioxidants make the picture even worse. The absolute, as well as relative amounts, of the various types of fatty acids make a difference. It also now appears that oxidation prior and during digestion may be important to the impact of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs). The source (perhaps even the meal composition) of the PUFAs was as important as omega-3 versus omega-6, for common, short chain PUFAs.

In some studies, omega-3 PUFAs, such as the short-chain alpha linolenic acid (ALA) common in flax seed or the long-chain fish oil FUFAs, eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), reduced cancer in human and mice. Earlier work in cell cultures showed that all of PUFAs suppressed the growth of cancer cells.

A large French study (reference below) began in 1993. Approximately 100,000 women between the ages of 40 and 65 volunteered to provide dietary and breast malignancy information and ca. 75,000 qualified for the study (the French component of EPIC, European Investigation of Cancer and Nutrition) . The dietary data provided information on the fatty acid composition of meals and revealed who was eating vegetable antioxidants and vitamins.

Major findings:

• Neither omega-6 nor omega-3 fatty acids were related directly to breast cancer risk.
• Long chain omega-3 fatty acids (EPA and DHA) reduced breast cancer in the group of women with the highest consumption of omega-6 PUFAs.
• High LA or ALA consumption in the form of vegetable oils or vegetables reduced cancer incidence.
• High LA or ALA consumption in the form of processed foods or nuts was associated with a higher incidence of breast cancer.
• Longer chain PUFAs were not associated with increased risk, regardless of source.

What does this mean?

• The source of the PUFA is of paramount importance. This study may apply more specifically to cancers and less to other inflammation-based degenerative diseases. The general anti-inflammatory diet may need refinement. I would suggest the following additions:
• Retain the preference for the more omega-3 friendly olive oil or perhaps flax oil versus the omega-6 rich vegetable oils (corn, soy, safflower), but focus on freshness and do not heat these oils.
• The data seem to be in favor of saturated fats for cooking. That means a shift to coconut oil.
• Vegetable antioxidants may be most important in the gut during digestion. Do these antioxidants even enter the blood stream? Certainly some alkaloids get to the brain, but much of the impact of the less mobile, large molecules may be restricted to the gut.
• An extension of this discussion may be to encourage eating more leafy vegetables with meat. That may be the paleo-diet connection.

reference:
Thiébaut AC, Chajès V, Gerber M, Boutron-Ruault MC, Joulin V, Lenoir G, Berrino F, Riboli E, Bénichou J, Clavel-Chapelon F. 2009. Dietary intakes of omega-6 and omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids and the risk of breast cancer. Int J Cancer. Feb 15;124(4):924-31.

Medical Advice Is Just Wrong

Medical advise says to avoid sun, fats and red meat, but to drink lots of water, eat polyunsaturated vegetable oils and focus on the grain-rich bottom of the food pyramid. The medical advice is simply wrong and is not supported by the biomedical literature. A recent article in a major medical journal claims that about 90% of medical advice is not based on clinical research studies, but rather represents the opinions of experts who are supported by the health industry. Most research is conducted to support products. Unfortunately the advice that comes from medical societies is not healthy.

Here I will provide a few examples to illustrate that medical advice is frequently, if not usually, wrong about diet, nutrition, cause of disease, appropriate drug use and whether to spend a few unprotected moments basking in sunshine.

The Sun Is Not the Enemy, but Sun Blockers Can Increase Skin Cancer

Medicine is supposed to provide instructions on how to handle dangerous chemicals and procedures safely and to enhance health. Solar radiation is dangerous and will cause skin cancer if used inappropriately, but solar radiation is also needed to produce vitamin D in skin. The public response to the medical mandate to limit solar exposure to reduce radiation-based skin cancer resulted in increased use of solar-blocking lotions. Unfortunately, the result was that some people spent more time in the sun, assuming that avoiding sun burns meant that they were avoiding skin cancer. Unknowingly they had shifted their skin exposure down from doses sufficient to kill cells and cause inflammation, to levels sufficient to just cause solar mutagenesis -- the lower exposures were optimal for skin cancer production.

Spare the Sun and Spoil the Child

Babies and children are the most sensitive to solar radiation induced skin cancer and need protection from over exposure, but the public response to medical advice has been to avoid prudent exposure to the sun. Now kids in the U.S. are showing symptoms of rickets, a vitamin D deficiency disease common during early industrialization, in which air pollution, urban poverty and factory work limited solar exposure. Babies in strollers are completely covered. One frightening consequence of this over-reaction could be a resurgence of poor bone growth that in the 1920’s resulted in the development of the now-trendy Cesarean section procedure to accommodate women with malformed pelvises due to rickets.

Rickets Is Rampant

Ubiquitous vitamin D deficiencies due to inadequate sun exposure is compounded by inadequate sources of dietary vitamin D and inappropriate medical interventions. Most vitamin D deficiencies go unnoticed, because the typical symptoms of deficiency mimic other forms of inflammation. When serum levels of vitamin D are actually measured and found to be inadequate, supplements of 600-1000 iu/day of vitamin D3 are prescribed. Unfortunately, there is seldom followup testing and a recent study indicates that most treatment for vitamin D deficiencies is inadequate -- much higher doses, ca. 2-5000 iu/day are required to reach optimum levels. Most people are and remain vitamin D deficient.

Scourge of Scurvy

Vitamin C deficiencies are also a problem. Most people get enough vitamin C to avoid losing their teeth (vitamin C is needed for collagen production), but subclinical deficiencies still produce chronic inflammation. The major cellular anti-oxidant is glutathione, but vitamin C is another major defense against reactive oxygen species (ROS). An increase in ROS triggers oxygen stress and inflammation. Deficiency of vitamin C indicates that more vitamin C is being used up than is being replenished in the diet. Numerous metabolic disturbances associated with other deficiencies or infections can result in vitamin C depletion and chronic inflammation. Most people are vitamin C deficient.

Vegetable Oils Are the Problem, Not the Cure

Medical advice to avoid saturated fats in meats and shift to omega-6-rich vegetable oils is a major contributor to chronic inflammation and modern degenerative diseases. The original claimed association between saturated fat consumption and cardiovascular disease was tenuous, but produced a glacial shift in diet toward consumption of omega-6 fatty acids, e.g. corn and soy oils. The medical dependence on measurements and treatments of LDL, has outweighed the actual data in the biomedical literature -- LDL levels are not important in cardiovascular disease. Drugs that lower LDL, serum cholesterol, are only effective in reducing heart disease, if they lower LDL by lowering inflammation. The risk factor is the inflammation, not the LDL level. Agricultural practices that use grain over grass further reduce the omega-3 fatty acid content of meat and increase the inflammatory omega-6 fatty acid level.

Statins Are a Problem, Not the Cure

Statins are broad spectrum disrupters of the function of many different enzymes and proteins. They were originally isolated from fungi based on their ability to poison bacteria, i.e. they are antibiotics. They disrupt fat metabolism and thereby lower LDL levels, but they also cause many undesirable and potentially dangerous side-effects. One of these actions is to block inflammation triggered by activation of the inflammation transcription factor, NFkB. By blocking NFkB activation, some statins lower inflammation and thereby decrease cardiovascular disease. This activity is similar to aspirin, which acts on COX-2 as well as directly on NFkB. Both statins and aspirin (NSAIDs) have multiple activities on numerous areas of cellular metabolism. The activities of both include reduction in inflammation, but they also produce other undesirable side effects. Chronic inflammation is better treated by diet, exercise and traditional herbs and spices, rather than more dangerous statins.

Water Is Miraculous, but just Satisfy Your Thirst

If you are thirsty drink tap water. There is no improvement in health by drinking some extra amount of water each day. Drinking water in plastic bottles from magical sources provides no improvement in health. Much of the “spring water” with designer labels is only locally bottled tap water. The plastic bottles are an ecological disaster and the “purified” water in the bottles is contaminated with compounds leaching from the bottles. If you want a constant source of water, bottle your own tap water. If you want to avoid the minor contaminants added to avoid bacterial contamination of municipal water supplies, use a simple point-of-use filter.

Starch Is the Problem

Starch is rapidly converted into blood glucose and that spike in blood sugar causes major problems. The foundation of the old food pyramid, grains, is no different than table sugar in being hyperglycemic, i.e. rapidly raising blood sugar. A large muscle mass and high physical activity can minimize the rise in blood sugar, by using up the sugar for muscle energy as it enters the blood. Unfortunately, most people do not have enough muscle and are not physically active enough to be protected from the starch and sugars in their diets. The result is chronic inflammation in the form of metabolic syndrome and degenerative diseases, e.g. diabetes, allergies, depression, acne, infertility, cardiovascular disease, autoimmune diseases and cancers.

One slice of white bread with a meal may be too much starch for some people. The maximum for most people is: one half of a ripe banana or one half cup of a starchy entree such as pasta, potato, rice, or one of the two buns on a burger. The starch needs to be spread over several meals. Eating too much starch with a meal produces intense hunger, as the blood sugar rapidly rises, triggers insulin release and a subsequent crash in blood sugar. Don’t believe any of the diets that recommend starches to replace fats. Many “lite” diet foods are more unhealthy than the higher fat originals that they replace. Replacing saturated fats with saturated starch is dangerous. The temporary high blood sugar level produces the increased health risks routinely associated with diabetes.

Insufficient Food Is the Problem -- Insufficient Minerals

It takes only 2-3000 Calories per day to energize most people. That means that most people can eat their day’s worth of calories with the sandwich plate at a fast food restaurant. That meal will provide an overdose of starch and sugar, but will be deficient in vitamins and minerals. A major dilemma is that it takes so little food to provide adequate energy for a low activity lifestyle, that the choice must be made between obesity and vitamin/mineral deficiencies. Eating just enough to satisfy energy needs results in deficiencies, but eating more to avoid vitamin/mineral deficiencies, results in obesity. The only solutions are to eat supplements to supply needed vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, etc. or increase physical activity and body muscle mass, so that more can be eaten without producing obesity. For most people the solution is a combination of increased physical activity and supplements. That combination is also found to reduce inflammation and the associated risk of degenerative diseases.

It’s the Stupid Diet

The obsession of medicine with drugs and invasive procedures provides additional health risks for patients. Many researchers complain in the biomedical literature that there is insufficient focus on the cause of disease and too much emphasis on the study of the impact of specific drugs on disease symptoms. The result is that in most cases the symptoms are treated and the disease becomes chronic. Of course this also means that the patient is a permanent consumer of health care.

The foundation of all healthcare should be to improve the lifestyle of the patient. Diseases don’t just happen. The biggest contributions of immediate family to disease of an individual are not defective genes, but rather defective diet and lifestyle habits. Our healthcare system is too no fault. People are sick because there is something wrong with how they live. They eat too much or they eat the wrong foods. They don’t get enough exercise to develop a healthy muscle system to support their joints. Most importantly, bad diet and lifestyle choices produce chronic inflammation. Drugs can reduce chronic inflammation, but will also produce additional side effects that will also require interventions. It makes more sense to attack the original causes of inflammation.

Every treatment program should address the pervasive contribution of chronic inflammation by including a diet and lifestyle inventory and an assessment of the cause of the disease that is being treated. An appropriate anti-inflammatory diet and a path toward a more active lifestyle should be the foundation of every treatment plan.

American Heart Association OKs Linoleic Acid and Arachidonic Acid

Can the AHA be correct in promoting omega-6 PUFAs? Doesn't this conflict with the broad therapeutic action of omega-3 PUFAs, EPA/DHA, against inflammatory diseases?

The dietary shift from saturated animal fats to polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) from vegetable oils paralleled the shift from infectious diseases to inflammatory/degenerative diseases as predominant killers in the Western world. Treatments for degenerative diseases associated with aging have improved, but these diseases have become more prevalent and the age of onset has decreased. And medical costs have skyrocketed. Omega-6 vegetable oils seem to be the problem, but the American Heart Association (AHA) has recently given these PUFAs a clean bill of health.

Why the AHA Conclusions Seem Just Wrong

The rise of inflammatory/degenerative diseases follows the shift to processed foods rich in omega-6 PUFAs (corn, soy, cottonseed, safflower oils) and simple carbohydrates (grain starch, sugar, high fructose corn syrup), but the AHA presents scientific data to exonerate omega-6 PUFAs. The central problem is that the AHA’s conclusions are not based on a conceptual framework to explain cardiovascular disease. Instead, conclusions are derived from experiments in which various diets are fed to people and consequences are analyzed. With some diseases, in which there is a simpler cause and effect relationship, this approach might lead to useful answers, unfortunately, the inflammatory component central to cardiovascular disease can have multiple, alternative origins and simple experiments yield misleading conclusions.

Experimental Basis for AHA Support for Omega-6 PUFAs

• Conversion of short PUFAs found in the diet, e.g. LA, to the long PUFAs that serve as the precursors of cellular hormones. But conversion is thought to be inefficient, so that less than 1% conversion occurs and short PUFAs have little impact on cellular long PUFA concentrations. Moreover, the brain does not perform the conversion and the high brain content of DHA is supplied on demand from DHA circulating in the blood.
• There don’t appear to be any direct, inflammatory derivatives of LA (C-18), but after it is converted to AA (C-20), the arachidonic acid is the starting point for the conversion to most of the inflammatory and anti-inflammatory cellular hormones, e.g. prostaglandins, leukotrienes and lipoxins. Thus inflammation is initiated by AA-derived products, but resolution and return to normal physiology is also based on other AA-derived products.
• Increases in blood plasma AA are associated with anti-inflammation, not inflammation.
• Increases in dietary AA and/or LA result in a decrease in cardiovascular disease. Replacing dietary saturated fat with PUFA leads to a reduction of disease by 25-50%. Higher serum LA translates into less disease.
• Increases in dietary LA result in lower serum cholesterol and LDL, but paradoxically they also lead to a narrowing of arteries.
• The relative amounts of dietary PUFAs (USA) are LA 15grams/day, AA 0.15g/d, ALA (omega-3, C-18, linolenic acid) 1g/d, EPA/DHA <>

Statins Lower Cardiovascular Disease by Lowering Inflammation (LDL Not Important)

The JUPITER study showed that the statin Crestor was effective in lowering heart disease, because it lowered inflammation. Individuals with chronic inflammation responded to Crestor by lowering inflammation. Lowering of LDL levels, however, was not related to decreasing disease. Elevated LDL levels may reflect inflammation.

Relating the JUPITER results to the AHA conclusions suggests that LA and AA may reduce inflammation and as a consequence also reduce serum LDL.

Inflammation Is the Cellular and Tissue Response to Many Stresses

The list of pathogens that trigger inflammation is long and includes specific signals from viruses, bacteria, fungi and protozoa. Pathogen-caused damage, as well as physical trauma, cause inflammation. Disruption of cellular metabolism and energy flow by vitamin, mineral, amino acid, or fatty acid deficiencies or excesses all produce inflammation. One of the difficulties of diagnosis is the overlapping of symptoms originating from numerous sources of underlying inflammation. Herniation of vertebral disks, for example, can be triggered by physical trauma, but it also may be initiated by the intestinal inflammation of gluten-based celiac. Acne and depression are common symptoms of chronic inflammation that may result from dietary deficiencies, gum disease, gluten sensitivity, etc. All of these examples respond to anti-inflammatory diets.

It is difficult to identify the sources of inflammation in experimental studies. In cardiovascular disease, the sources of inflammation are commonly not known in individual cases and the cardiac symptoms are treated. In reality, these are actually many different diseases, all with different sources of inflammation, pigeon-holed under the same symptom, a cardiac event. The most effective long term treatment for the dispart group is general suppression of inflammation. Any specific treatment of a root cause only works on a small subset of the group and would be considered ineffective. Thus, statins are considered effective against heart disease, because they reduce inflammation that is common to the whole group. Reduction of LDL is inadvertently used as a measure of control of inflammation and has become inappropriately designated as a risk factor. Directly lowering LDL has no impact on heart disease, but it is easy to measure. Inflammation is hard to measure and finding the source of inflammation is harder still.

Omega-6 Vs. Omega-3 Is Another False Dichotomy

Just as there is no opposite to inflammation, omega-6 and omega-3 fatty acids are not in opposition. The action of aspirin is the big clue. Aspirin changes the structures of the enzymes involved in converting AA into inflammatory prostaglandins and leukotrienes, with the result that anti-inflammatory lipoxins are produced instead. Aspirin is a biochemical switch that mimics the natural transition of the cellular machinery from producing enzymes that accentuate inflammation, to enzymes and signals that are the next step in the cycle, repair and restoration of normalcy.

Omega-6 PUFAs are needed for both inflammation and restoration of normal cellular functions. Some of the enzymes produced during inflammation are needed for the reset to normalcy. The difficulty comes when inflammation is sustained, components are depleted and the cycle cannot be completed. The result then is chronic inflammation, the symptoms of metabolic syndrome and degenerative diseases.

Why Did Demonizing LA and AA Seem Right?

It seems wise not to trust medicine, dietitians and the food industry, because they have made so many lamentable mistakes making dietary suggestions that have shortened so many lives. Professional societies like the AHA also frequently give silly advice, because the advice doesn’t reflect the best information from the biomedical literature. So it makes sense to be skeptical.

In this case the AHA appears to be right, only because established views were supported by straightforward experiments. What determines if an excess of dietary LA and AA is going to be a problem with inflammation is the absolute amount of AA and EPA available on the surface of immune cells. PUFAs are attached as part of the phospholipids of the lipid rafts on the membrane surface of immune cells that have received a inflammatory signal, e.g. bacterial lipopolysaccharide. There is usually adequate AA to be converted by enzymes on the cell surface to produce further inflammatory signals. The problem comes if there is so much AA that the EPA never made it to the lipid rafts. The result would be inadequate EPA conversion to anti-inflammatory prostaglandins and failure to return to normalcy. This would be a particular weakness in the presence of a large depletion of the EPA pools during sustained inflammation and chronic inflammation would result.

Thus, the AHA promotion of omega-6 PUFAs is half right. They should have said that omega-6 fatty acids are not a problem, if there is adequate EPA/DHA and no sustained inflammation. Unfortunately, the Western diet provides inadequate EPA/DHA and deficiencies that constantly produce inflammation. Of course, those enjoying an anti-inflammatory diet and lifestyle have biochemical tolerance for the AHA’s suggestions. Others eat vegetable oils at their peril.

reference:

Harris WS, Mozaffarian D, Rimm E, Kris-Etherton P, Rudel LL, Appel LJ, Engler MM, Engler MB, Sacks F. 2009. Omega-6 Fatty Acids and Risk for Cardiovascular Disease. A Science Advisory From the American Heart Association Nutrition Subcommittee of the Council on Nutrition, Physical Activity, and Metabolism; Council on Cardiovascular Nursing; and Council on Epidemiology and Prevention. Circulation. 2009 Jan 26. [Epub ahead of print]

Lectins - Heat’em and Eat’em

Lectins are proteins common in seeds. They bind to sugars attached in chains to proteins, i.e. glycoproteins, and are displayed on the surfaces of cells that line the gut. Lectins could inhibit digestion of raw beans, but cooking makes them digestible.

Fear of lectins is puzzling. Lectins are proteins that have binding sites on their surfaces for specific single or small sequences of sugars. They are present in seeds to protect the seeds from herbivores.

A seed is mostly food (starch, protein, fat) for the plant embryo that will grow from it. This is also true of a chicken egg and just like the egg, the seed contains defensive proteins to inhibit the growth of bacteria, fungi and egg/seed eaters.

The egg has enzymes to degrade bacterial walls and proteins that bind iron, vitamins, etc. needed by bacteria and humans. Eating many raw eggs can lead to vitamin deficiencies. Boiling the eggs, unravels the defensive proteins and makes them digestible and nutritious.

Seeds block being digested by containing proteins that foul the digestion system of would be devourers. For example, soybeans have trypsin inhibitor that binds to our digestive enzyme and makes eating raw soybeans nonproductive and uncomfortable. Boiling soybean meal to produce a curd, i.e. tofu, agglutinates the denatured soy proteins, including the lectins and washes away the soy trypsin inhibitor. Tofu is free of digestion inhibitors and lectin activity.

It is not an accident that lectins bind to human red blood cells. The sugars displayed on the surface of red blood cells are the blood group antigens. Different sugars on the end of the sugar chains decorating RBCs characterize the A, B and O antigens. These same sugars are present on the surfaces of various bacteria. Immune systems don’t produce antibodies to self antigens, so a person with type A blood produces antibodies only to B antigen sugars it encounters on bacteria. A person who is type AB doesn’t produce antibodies to A or B sugar antigens. There aren’t antibodies to O, because that sugar structure is the basis upon which both A and B are made, and some of the
structure is present on all RBCs. Lectins are specific for A or B or other common bacterial sugar antigens.

I did some modeling to show a lectin with lactose (red and gray) bound to sticky tryptophans (yellow) in two places on the surface. In one case a lysine (blue) is draped on the other side. That shows that sugars bind both to aromatic amino acids and to the hydrophobic arms of basic amino acids.


Some people think that humans and other mammals must be protected from lectins and that this protection is shown in human and cow’s milk in the form of antibodies against lectins. This seems to be a misunderstanding. For example, human antibodies secreted in breast milk are secretory IgAs. These antibodies are glycoproteins, i.e. they are proteins with attached sugar chains. Some lectins will bind to these antibodies, because of the attached sugars. These are not lectin-specific antibodies, but rather glyco-specific lectins. The lectins are binding to the glycoprotein antibodies, not the other way around.

It is possible for people to be allergic to lectins, but this is unlikely. For example, peanut allergies involve proteins other than the peanut lectins.

There are some dangerous lectins. For example, ricin is a very nasty, but effective, toxin produced by the castor plant. Ricin is a lectin, in that it binds very specifically to sugars found on the surface of gut cells of insects and humans. After the ricin binds to surface proteins, it is brought into the cells where it chops up the protein synthesizing machinery. That is a dangerous lectin. It takes very little ricin to kill each cell and only a tiny amount to kill a human. Ricin is a terrorist toxin. Yet oil extracted from castor beans contains so little contaminating ricin that it is safe to eat. [Castor oil is wonderful to apply to aching feet overnight for painfree, luxuriously soft feet in the morning.]

The bottom line is that seed lectins add to the nutrition of cooked beans and grains that have been the foundations for several thriving civilizations. The longest living members of the bean and grain cultures are typically older and more fit than comparable individuals with a modern, inflammatory diet based on omega-6 oils.

Menstrual Pain is Inflammatory

Inflammation is essential to the menstrual cycle. At key points inflammatory prostaglandins are made from omega-6 arachidonic acid to trigger ovulation and menses, the discharge of the blood-engorged lining of the uterus. Chronic diet-based inflammation can result in disrupted ovulation, infertility due to an inability to suppress an inflammatory response to egg implantation, menstrual pain/cramps and premature birth.

Several studies have shown that reducing diet-based inflammation by eating supplements containing long chain omega-3 oils, e.g. fish oil, decreased menstrual pain and cramps. The reduction in chronic inflammation was associated with decreased production of inflammatory prostaglandins that are the cause of the pain and intense uterine contractions. Normally, the diet would provide a balance of omega-3 and -6 fatty acids, which would yield a mixture of anti-inflammatory and inflammatory prostaglandins, and produce an effective discharge through more moderate uterine contractions.

A more recent evaluation of numerous studies on the impact of omega-3 oils on pain associated with menstruation, arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease, etc., showed a uniform decrease in inflammation and pain. The simple summary is that an inflammatory diet rich in omega-6 vegetable oils leads to pain, suffering and premature aging. A more normal diet with a balance of omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids leads to health and reduced aging.

Typical symptoms of an inflammatory diet are: menstrual cramps, infertility (gestational problems: preeclampsia, prematurity), joint pain, back pain/sciatica, acne, allergies, asthma, autoimmune diseases. There is increasing evidence that obesity not only produces inflammation, but that an inflammatory diet can lead to obesity. An inflammatory diet, especially if augmented with antibiotics, disrupts the normal gut flora and leads to an inflammatory replacement flora that supports chronic inflammation throughout the body.

Chronic inflammation and much of the damage caused by chronic inflammation is reversible by a shift to an anti-inflammatory diet and lifestyle (described elsewhere on this blog.)

references:
Deutch B. 1995. Menstrual pain in Danish women correlated with low n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid intake. Eur J Clin Nutr. 49(7):508-16.

Goldberg RJ, Katz J. 2007. A meta-analysis of the analgesic effects of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid supplementation for inflammatory joint pain. Pain 129(1-2):210-23.

Bell RF. 2007. Food and pain: should we be more interested in what our patients eat? Pain. 129(1-2):5-7.

Anti-inflammatory Octopus

I always envied the neurophysiologists who studied the giant axons of lobster, because they could always eat their failed experiments. I was working on a fungal disease of soybeans. It had no gourmet prospects. My revenge came decades later, when I took a “research” trip to Tuscany to study the impact of Mediterranean cuisine on inflammation. Fish, cephalopods, red wine and tiramisu were my test materials and I was the test organism. For a month, I felt no stress, no inflammation and no pain. Recent research articles support my subjective conclusion that seafood and red wine from Siena to Venice are anti-inflammatory.

Recent tests of the fatty acid composition of Mediterranean fish and octopus show that the ratio of omega-3 to omega-6 fatty acids in the fish and octopus is roughly 2:1. (In contrast, the US ratio is 1:20) The omega-7 fatty acid, palmitoleic acid, which appears to act as an anti-inflammatory hormone, was also present. The prominent place of seafood in the Mediterranean diet and the high omega-3-rich fatty acid composition of that seafood, combined with the absence of the inflammatory, omega-6-rich vegetable oils, corn, soy, safflower, of the inflammatory US dietand the use of olive oil, go a long way to explain the relatively low incidence of inflammatory diseases in people who eat a Mediterranean diet. Just add some sunshine and exercise, and you will live better and longer.

Oh, by the way, the tiramisu was my daughters’ project to evaluate local variation of that dessert throughout Italy. So we ate tiramisu at a different restaurant each day for a month. The differences were amazing and the best tiramisu in Italy is ...

But the bottom line is the same. The Mediterranean diet is nothing more than another variant of the anti-inflammatory diet and lifestyle that I have been discussing throughout this blog. Biomedical research says that the US diet is killing us. You can go to Tuscany or you can just shop, cook and live wisely wherever you are.

references:
Ozogul Y, Ozogul F, Cicek E, Polat A, Kuley E. 2008. Fat content and fatty acid compositions of 34 marine water fish species from the Mediterranean Sea. Int J Food Sci Nutr. Oct 29:1-12.

Ben-Youssef S, Selmi S, Ezzeddine-Najai S, Sadok S. 2008. Total lipids and fatty acids composition of the coastal and the deep-sea common octopus (Octopus vulgaris) populations: a comparative study. Nutr Health. 19(3):195-201.

Hazards of Air Travel: DVT

Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT) -- clots in your veins

Air travel during the holidays means sitting quietly for hours while the blood pools in the major veins of your legs. This is a test. How have you been eating lately? If you stuck to an anti-inflammatory diet and got your exercise, just fidgeting a little and flexing your legs ever once in a while should avoid clots. If you are the typical sedentary American with an inflammatory diet, then worry. One tenth of you will typically have clots in your leg veins after a long flight.

Rolling stones gather no moss, and the same is true for rapidly moving red blood cells (RBCs). Keep them moving and they don’t stick together. Slow down RBCs traveling along sticky vessel walls and you have problems. RBCs have no nuclei and since the intracellular secretory system originates from the outer membrane of the nucleus, red blood cells don’t secrete anything. RBCs just age until they are removed by the spleen. So RBCs just move passively with the rest of the blood.

Another player in clot formation is the platelet. Platelets are cell fragments. They are formed by extrusion and shearing. The process is like bubbles forming as you blow air through a child’s bubble wand. Cells in the bone marrow are squeezed through a grid and the extruded fingers of the cells are blown away in the blood flow as platelets. The electron micrograph shows a platelet between and RBC and a white blood cell. Platelets don’t have any active cell machinery, so they are just little bags containing secretory vesicles that can be released by triggering of receptors on their surface. Platelets are only good for one shot of release.

Platelet release of secretory contents is triggered by norepinephrin, ADP and PGI2, an inflammatory prostaglandin produced from the omega-6 arachidonic acid. Norepinephrin is one of the fight-or-flight hormones that prepares the vascular system for damage control. ADP is released from other activated platelets and insures that isolated platelets are not randomly activated.

One of the proteins released is platelet factor 4. I have illustrated PF4 and the strip of basic amino acids (blue) that girdles the protein are readily apparent. PF4 binds strongly to heparin. Since the clotting process is normally under heparin inhibition, PF4 release from platelets removes the heparin inhibition and promotes clotting. ADP is also released and promotes further activation of other platelets.

Clot formation occurs in response to stress (norepinephrin), damage (vascular inflammation) and a consensus of platelets (ADP). Chronic inflammation can mimic this combination of signals through its impact on heparin metabolism. My research suggests that inflammation lowers heparin synthesis. An example of this effect is kidney damage caused by diabetes. High blood sugar causes inflammation of the kidney blood vessels, this reduces heparin production and since heparin lining the vessels is needed to retain proteins as blood is filtered in the kidney, protein is lost into the urine, i.e. proteinuria. Similarly, chronic inflammation can disrupt the blood brain barrier that is also made up of heparin.

A major source of chronic inflammation is an inflammatory diet. A recent research study indicated that a typical inflammatory American diet leads to elevated risk for deep vein thrombosis. Alternatively, an anti-inflammatory diet rich in B vitamins and omega-3 oils minimized DVT. Saturated fats had no impact, consistent with the lack of evidence supporting the shift from saturated fats to toxic omega-6-rich polyunsaturated vegetable oils.

So, the best thing that you can do to protect yourself from clots when you travel over the holidays, is to eat right and get your exercise, before you travel. Avoid starch (in large amounts) and polyunsaturated vegetable oils (except olive oil.) Corn oil, soy oil, cottonseed oil and safflower oil are particularly inflammatory. Eat plenty of veggies and fruits and enjoy the turkey and cranberries. Make sure that the only sweeteners used are sugar and honey (avoid high fructose corn syrup.) Light corn syrup is the stealth form of HFCS -- it may be lower in calories, since fructose is sweeter than sugar, but it is highly inflammatory! (Research also indicates that fructose causes premature wrinkling and skin aging, by enhancing the crosslinking of collagen. HFCS also causes type II diabetes in lab animals.)