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Mushroom Beat
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Antioxidant Slot
Top Antioxidants
Mushroom, carrot, spinach, and others – all packed with nutrients are
effective in ensuring a healthy diet.
Antioxidants – scavengers of free radicals – found in a host of fruit and
vegetable are believed to help the body fight a raft of chronic diseases. Antioxidants are believed to play a role in warding off a number
of serious health conditions, including heart disease and stroke, high
blood pressure and some types of cancer. Nutrients found in certain
fruits and vegetables have also been linked to a reduced risk of other
health conditions, such as beta-carotene (from sources including
carrots and cantaloupe) and cataracts, and folic acid (from spinach,
asparagus, oranges and others) and Alzheimer’s disease.
Fresh research from food scientists suggests
that button mushrooms are the number one
source for the antioxidant ergothioneine.
Researchers at Penn State University in the US
claim that white button mushrooms, the most
commonly consumed kind in the US, have
about 12 times more of the antioxidant than
wheat germ and four times more than chicken
liver, the previous top-rated ergothioneine
sources based on available data.
Ergothioneine, a unique metabolite produced by
fungi, has been shown to have strong antioxidant
properties and to provide cellular protection within
the human body, says Joy Dubost, doctoral candidate in food science, who conducted the
study. The Penn State food scientists report that
among the most commonly consumed mushrooms, portabellas and criminis have the most
ergothioneine, followed closely by the white
buttons. They found that a standard 3-ounce
serving (a handful) of these mushrooms, supplies up to 5mg.
Exotic mushrooms have even more ergothioneine. The same standard serving size of shiitake, king oyster or maitake (hen of the woods)
can contain up to 13mg in a three ounce serving, or about 40 times as much as what germ.
Dubost notes that the levels of ergothioneine
do not decrease when the mushrooms are
cooked.
Other Good Antioxidants:
Cranberries
Cranberries are the fruits with the greatest antioxidant properties, according to a number of studies. They were shown to be among the best at
fighting cancer, inhibiting the growth of common foodborne pathogens
and aiding in the prevention of urinary tract infections (UTIs).
One study looked at 20 different juices and found that cranberry juice
had the highest total phenol content. Biochemist Yuegang Zuo from the
University of Massachusets-Dartmouth said that cranberry juice had the
highest radical scavenging capacity among the different fruits studied.
In a second study, Catherine Neto, assistant professor at the University
of Massachusetts-Dartmouth, isolated several bioactive compounds from
whole cranberries and found that flavonoids showed strong antioxidant
activity. She also found that newly discovered compounds in the berries
were toxic to a variety of cancer tumour cells. The tumour cell lines that
these compounds inhibited most in our assays included lung, cervical, prostate, breast and leukemia, she said.
As well as the cancer fighting properties of the red berries, the fruit also
had the ability to act as a natural probiotic – supporting the natural bacteria which grow in the human gastro-intestinal tract and killing of the
bacteria which promote infections and foodborne illnesses.
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