Nutraceuticals define a new category which shades the frontier between drugs and food. As per its definition, a nutraceutical is “a food or part of a food that provides benefits health in addition to ...its nutritional content”. Active substances either way extracted from plants (phytocomplexes) or of animal origin, when extracted, concentrated and administered in a suitable pharmaceutical form, can create a very promising toolbox useful to prevent and/or support the therapy of some pathologic conditions given their proven clinical efficacy. It is worldwide recognized that diet and lifestyle are essential to promote and maintain well-being and nice-being condition, other than help to prevent diseases possible onset. Both non-correct dietary habits and lifestyle can in fact determine pathological conditions. The metabolic syndrome, a worldwide epidemic threat, can be named an outstanding example. This syndrome is characterized by a cascade of cardio metabolic risk factors which include obesity, insulin resistance, hypertension, and dyslipidemia. Prevention is the key strategy for an effective proactive medicine, in which efforts are addressed to prevention and, consequently, to lower the risk connected to some lifestyle related diseases reducing, at the same time, any National Health Systems cost needed to guarantee the proper therapeutic approach based on pharmaceuticals. Nutraceuticals use in prevention is a proactive reverse approach tool to pre-clinical health conditions. They can be effectively used, by including in the daily diet, in an area which shades in the range “beyond the diet, before drugs”, since they combine both nutritional and beneficial healthy properties of food extracts with the healing properties of natural active compounds.
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Currently, nutraceuticals do not have a specific definition distinct from those of other food‐derived categories, such as food supplements, herbal products, pre‐ and probiotics, functional foods, and ...fortified foods. Many studies have led to an understanding of the potential mechanisms of action of pharmaceutically active components contained in food that may improve health and reduce the risk of pathological conditions while enhancing overall well‐being. Nevertheless, there is a lack of clear information and, often, the claimed health benefits may not be properly substantiated by safety and efficacy information or in vitro and in vivo data, which can induce false expectations and miss the target for a product to be effective, as claimed. An officially shared and accepted definition of nutraceuticals is still missing, as nutraceuticals are mostly referred to as pharma‐foods, a powerful toolbox to be used beyond the diet but before the drugs to prevent and treat pathological conditions, such as in subjects who may not yet be eligible for conventional pharmaceutical therapy. Hence, it is of utmost importance to have a proper and unequivocal definition of nutraceuticals and shared regulations. It also seems wise to assess the safety, mechanism of action and efficacy of nutraceuticals with clinical data. A growing demand exists for nutraceuticals, which seem to reside in the grey area between pharmaceuticals and food. Nonetheless, given specific legislation from different countries, nutraceuticals are experiencing challenges with safety and health claim substantiation.
Essential oils are complex mixtures of hydrocarbons and their oxygenated derivatives arising from two different isoprenoid pathways. Essential oils are produced by glandular trichomes and other ...secretory structures, specialized secretory tissues mainly diffused onto the surface of plant organs, particularly flowers and leaves, thus exerting a pivotal ecological role in plant. In addition, essential oils have been used, since ancient times, in many different traditional healing systems all over the world, because of their biological activities. Many preclinical studies have documented antimicrobial, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and anticancer activities of essential oils in a number of cell and animal models, also elucidating their mechanism of action and pharmacological targets, though the paucity of in human studies limits the potential of essential oils as effective and safe phytotherapeutic agents. More well-designed clinical trials are needed in order to ascertain the real efficacy and safety of these plant products.
There is a mechanistic link between the gut-derived metabolite trimethylamine-N-oxide (TMAO) and obesity-related diseases, suggesting that the TMAO pathway may also be linked to the pathogenesis of ...obesity. The Visceral Adiposity Index (VAI), a gender-specific indicator of adipose dysfunction, and the Fatty Liver Index (FLI), a predictor of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), are early predictors of metabolic syndrome (MetS). In this cross-sectional observational study, we investigated TMAO levels in adults stratified according to Body Mass Index (BMI) and the association of TMAO with VAI and FLI. One hundred and thirty-seven adult subjects (59 males; 21⁻56 years) were enrolled. TMAO levels were detected using HPLC/MS analysis. Homeostatic Model Assessment of Insulin Resistance (HoMA-IR), VAI and FLI were included as cardio-metabolic indices. TMAO levels increased along with BMI and were positively associated with VAI and FLI, independently, on common potential covariates. The most sensitive and specific cut-offs for circulating levels of TMAO to predict the presence of NAFLD-FLI and MetS were ≥8.02 µM and ≥8.74 µM, respectively. These findings allow us to hypothesize a role of TMAO as an early biomarker of adipose dysfunction and NAFLD-FLI in all borderline conditions in which overt MetS is not present, and suggest that a specific cut-off of TMAO might help in identifying subjects at high risk of NAFLD.
Mounting evidences are supporting a key role of distinct gut bacteria in the occurrence and progression of intestinal and extra-intestinal tumors. More importantly, it has been recently demonstrated ...that some gut bacteria strains synergize with largely-used anticancer drugs as alkylating or immune checkpoint blockade agents thus optimizing the immune response against multiple solid cancers. However, the exact role played by each gut bacterium in cancer occurrence and response to therapy is still in its infancy; and the current knowledge, although exciting, still needs to be transferred from mice models to human beings. Here, the advances in the understanding of how gut microbes and immune response shape each other in a cancer context are reviewed together with the implications of these finding for future antitumor therapy. Herein, the most important bacteria strains, able to boost the immune response triggered by anticancer drugs, together with their mechanism of action, whenever known, have been surveyed. It is reasonable to think that cocktails of beneficial bacteria together with an ad hoc diet or food supplements may be used as novel anticancer adjuvant agents in future therapeutic regimens.
The antioxidant activity and the relationship between total antioxidant activity and the main classes of antioxidants in the seeds of bitter and sweet
Chenopodium quinoa seeds were measured before ...and after boiling, in order to establish which one showed the best antioxidant property and how a traditional cooking method could affect it. Our results, obtained by using DPPH (1,1-diphenyl-2-picrilhydrazyl) and FRAP (Ferric Reducing/Antioxidant Power) methods, showed that antioxidant activity of bitter seeds was higher than that of sweet seeds. This activity principally depended on phenols and flavonoids in bitter seeds, while it was mainly due to phenol, flavonoid and carotenoid compounds in sweet seeds. Moreover, boiling caused a significant loss of antioxidant capacity in water.
Trimethylamine N-oxide (TMAO) is considered a novel risk factor for cardiovascular diseases. Several studies demonstrated that polyphenols are able to inhibit the growth of TMA-producing bacterial ...strains, and resveratrol (RSV) reduced TMAO levels in mice. In the present study, we evaluated the TMAO-reducing effect of a novel nutraceutical formulation containing grape pomace extract in humans (Taurisolo
). The Taurisolo
polyphenol content was evaluated by a High Performance Liquid Chromatography-diode-array detector (HPLC-DAD) method, and RSV was monitored as an indicative marker. After in vitro GI digestion, intestinal bioaccessibility of RSV was 92.3%. A randomized, placebo-controlled, cross-over trial was carried out to evaluate the TMAO-reducing effect of Taurisolo
. In acute, the maximum levels of RSV were detected both in serum and whole blood 60 min after the administration of Taurisolo
; in chronic, a significant increase of RSV was detected in serum after the 4-week treatment. After 4 weeks, the levels of TMAO were significantly decreased in the treatment group compared to placebo (63.6% vs. 0.54%, respectively,
< 0.0001). In conclusion, our data show that Taurisolo
may represent a novel and useful natural remedy to reduce prognostic markers for incident cardiovascular events. Undoubtedly, further in vitro and in vivo studies need to be performed in order to elucidate possible mechanisms of action and corroborate our preliminary results.
Almonds (
Miller D. A. Webb (the almond or sweet almond)), from the Rosaceae family, have long been known as a source of essential nutrients; nowadays, they are in demand as a healthy food with ...increasing popularity for the general population and producers. Studies on the composition and characterization of almond macro- and micronutrients have shown that the nut has many nutritious ingredients such as fatty acids, lipids, amino acids, proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins and minerals, as well as secondary metabolites. However, several factors affect the nutritional quality of almonds, including genetic and environmental factors. Therefore, investigations evaluating the effects of different factors on the quality of almonds were also included. In epidemiological studies, the consumption of almonds has been associated with several therapeutically and protective health benefits. Clinical studies have verified the modulatory effects on serum glucose, lipid and uric acid levels, the regulatory role on body weight, and protective effects against diabetes, obesity, metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular diseases. Moreover, recent researchers have also confirmed the prebiotic potential of almonds. The present review was carried out to emphasize the importance of almonds as a healthy food and source of beneficial constituents for human health, and to assess the factors affecting the quality of the almond kernel. Electronic databases including PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science and SciFinder were used to investigate previously published articles on almonds in terms of components and bioactivity potentials with a particular focus on clinical trials.
Polyphenols from flesh and peels of red pitaya (Hylocereus polyrhizus) fruit were quantified by employing an extract sub-fractionation procedure applied for the first time to this fruit. Higher ...polyphenolic contents than those from the literature were measured by using analogous spectroscopic techniques to those reported in previous works. Betacyanin fractions exhibited the highest reducing and radical-scavenging capacities among the extracts and fractions tested by FRAP and DPPH assays, respectively. Finally, polyphenolic fractions showed a broad antimicrobial spectrum by inhibiting the growth of all of food-borne pathogens tested, while the non-fractionated extracts revealed a very low or no activity. Results indicated flesh as a good source of antioxidants with healthy benefits for human diet and peels as a valuable manufacture by-product to be exploited for the formulation of nutraceuticals and food applications.
The herpes simplex virus (HSV) is a common human virus affecting many people worldwide. HSV infections manifest with lesions that occur in different parts of the body, including oral, ocular, nasal, ...and genital skin and mucosa. In rare cases, HSV infections can be serious and lethal. Several anti-HSV drugs have been developed, but the existence of mutant viruses resistant to these drugs led to the individuation of novel antiviral agents. Plant-derived bioactive compounds, and more specifically polyphenols, have been demonstrated to exert marked anti-HSV activity and, among these, resveratrol (RSV) would be considered a good candidate. The purpose of this manuscript is to review the available literature elucidating the efficacy of RSV against HSV and the main demonstrated mechanisms of action.
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