Dairy food products: good or bad for cardiometabolic disease?

Prevalence of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is rapidly increasingly and is a key risk for CVD development, now recognised as the leading cause of death globally. Dietary strategies to reduce CVD development include reduction of saturated fat intake. Milk and dairy products are the largest contributors to dietary saturated fats in the UK and reduced consumption is often recommended as a strategy for risk reduction. However, overall evidence from prospective cohort studies does not confirm a detrimental association between dairy product consumption and CVD risk. The present review critically evaluates the current evidence on the association between milk and dairy products and risk of CVD, T2DM and the metabolic syndrome (collectively, cardiometabolic disease). The effects of total and individual dairy foods on cardiometabolic risk factors and new information on the effects of the food matrix on reducing fat digestion are also reviewed. It is concluded that a policy to lower SFA intake by reducing dairy food consumption to reduce cardiometabolic disease risk is likely to have limited or possibly negative effects. There remain many uncertainties, including differential effects of different dairy products and those of differing fat content. Focused and suitably designed and powered studies are needed to provide clearer evidence not only of the mechanisms involved, but how they may be beneficially influenced during milk production and processing

Carotenoids in Thermal Adaptation of Plants and Animals

The support of carotenoids in photosynthesis is well documented. However, what is their role in parts of plants where there is no photosynthesis such as in fruits or stems or even in parts which are not exposed to the light at all, such as seeds or roots? Why are carotenoids essential for all animals and humans and present in almost every tissue in their body? The answer is that carotenoids can make complexes with lipids, which results in an increase of lipid thermal energy absorption and a reduction of viscosity. These changes help to expand the temperature range for the functionality of lipid structures, improve the capacity of thermal homeostasis and support adaptation and survival of living species to environmental stress and in particular to temperature variations. Working as “thermal antennas” carotenoids can increase lipid thermal energy conductivity, heat storage and heat retaining capacity. This, on the one hand, can reduce the freezing/melting points of plant and animal lipids and makes carotenoids work as antifreezers in microorganisms, plants or ectothermic animals. On the other hand, the thermal antennas can help absorb, transmit and accumulate external thermal energy essential to activate and support cellular metabolism. In addition, we describe how these properties of carotenoids can affect lipid parameters in nutrition, physiology and pathology

Cocobiota: Implications for Human Health

Manufacturing of dark chocolate and other cocoa-based products is a complex multistage process beginning with spontaneous cocoa bean fermentation driven in the postharvest period by different microorganisms derived from the environment. Cocobiota defined as the association of microbial species involved in cocoa bean fermentation may have considerable impact on the medicinal properties of cocoa products via various primary and secondary metabolites, whose presence in dark chocolate and other cocoa-derived products has to be taken into consideration when analyzing medicinal effects of cocoa. Metabolites of acetic acid and lactic acid bacteria, two major cocobiota members, are recently shown to have considerable antifungal and cholesterol-lowering activities and promote the formation of short chain fatty acids and mannitol, an important prebiotic capable of modifying gut microbiota. Penicillium citrinum, a major type of fungi identifiable in fermented cocoa beans, produces a thermostable alkaloid, Penicitrinine A, as well as lovastatin, compounds with antineoplastic and cholesterol-lowering abilities, respectively. Moreover, recent results suggest that bacterial and fungal metabolites produced by cocobiota have a significant anti-infective potential. Therefore, various metabolites produced by cocobiota can mimic some medicinal effects of dark chocolate and other cocoa-derived products previously attributed to cocoa flavonoids and methylxanthines and need to be thoroughly investigated in in vitro and in vivo systems

Reduction of cholesterol and markers of oxidation in serum of hypercholestrolemic patients treated with lycosome formulation of simvastatin

Background: Use of microencapsulated HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors (statins) might be extremely helpful in the prevention of their side effects.Methods: 24 volunteers with hypercholesterolemia were given once daily 20 mg of lycosome-formulated Simvastatin fused with 7 mg lycopene (Lyco-Simvastatin) or the same amount of unmodified Simvastatin with no lycopene. Control patients received 7 mg of lycopene alone. Plasma lipids and oxidative markers were measured after 4 weeks of treatment.Results: Both formulations of Simvastatin, but not lycopene, caused a reduction in serum total cholesterol and LDL at the intermediate (end of 2nd week) and final (end of 4th week) points of interventional period. Notably, reduction of total cholesterol and LDL in the 4th week of the trial was more profound in patients treated with Lyco-Simvastatin versus unmodified Simvastatin (P<0.05). Patients treated with Lyco-Simvastatin showed a reduction in serum Apo B level, which was not observed in other groups. Lycopene treatment caused a modest but statistically significant decrease in serum triglyceride. However, the triglyceride-lowering effect of Simvastatin was more profound in the case of Lyco-Simvastatin treatment. Lycopene as well as unmodified Simvastatin gave a marginal reduction of Inflammatory Oxidative Damage. Remarkably, the combined formulation of Simvastatin and lycopene gave a significant reduction in the values for oxidative damage (reduction of median by 112.5 µM, P<0.05). Similar synergistic effect was observed when levels of oxidized LDL were analyzed.Conclusions: Lycosome-formulated microencapsulated Simvastatin has a better cholesterol-lowering and antioxidant capacity presumably due to enhanced bioavailability of the drug and synergism with lycopene

TEMPORARY INTRALUMINAL SHUNTING UNDER CONDITIONS OF A PARALLEL CARDIOPULMONARY BYPASS

Purpose: to study the effect of application of intraluminal coronary bypass grafts on the intra- and early postoperative periods in patients with coronary artery disease, who underwent a direct myocardial revascularization under conditions of a parallel cardiopulmonary bypass.Material and methods: the study included patients with multiple lesions of coronary arteries with an ejection fraction 51,2% ± 5,3. The patients were randomised into 2 groups: in the first group (n = 41) the cardiopulmonary bypass operation was accompanied by using intraluminal coronary grafts; in the second group (n = 52) - without this procedure. The superior effectiveness of the graft procedure was assessed by lesser changes in ST-segment of ECG during and after the operation, fluctuations in cardiac index, the value of the plasma fraction of cardiac creatine phosphokinase, and a number of complications during the intra-and postoperative periods.Summary: based on these data it was concluded the advantage of application of intraluminal coronary bypass grafts with direct revascularization in parallel artificial circulation

The cientificWorldJOURNAL Clinical Study Whey Protein Lycosome Formulation Improves Vascular Functions and Plasma Lipids with Reduction of Markers of Inflammation and Oxidative Stress in Prehypertension

Parameters reflecting cardiovascular health and inflammation were studied in a pilot clinical trial conducted on 40 patients with prehypertension. The patients were treated with a new proprietary formulation of a whey protein (WP) isolate embedded into lycopene micelles (WPL) during a 1-month period. Control groups received lycopene or WP as a singular formulation or placebo pills for the same period of time. Combined WPL formulation of whey protein and lycopene has caused multiple favorable changes in the cardiovascular function (including a tendency to the reduced systemic blood pressure), the plasma lipid profile, and the inflammatory status of patients with prehypertension, whereas singular formulations of the compounds and placebo did not have such an effect. The reduction of plasma triglycerides and cholesterol fractions and almost two-fold decline in C-reactive protein (CRP) and inflammatory oxidative damage (IOD) levels as well as an increase in nitric oxide (NO), tissue oxygenation (StO 2 ), and flow-mediated dilation values constitute the most significant benefit/outcome of the treatment with the combined formulation of whey protein and lycopene. The treatment did not affect the values of ankle-brachial index (ABI), body weight, and body mass index (BMI)

Roquefort Cheese Proteins Inhibit Chlamydia pneumoniae

Inflammation in atherosclerosis, which could be associated with some subclinical infections such as C. pneumoniae, is one of the key factors responsible for the development of clinical complications of this disease. We report that a proprietary protein extract isolated from Roquefort cheese inhibits the propagation of C. pneumoniae in a human HL cell line in a dose-dependent manner, as revealed by the immunofluorescence analysis. These changes were accompanied by a significant reduction in the infective progeny formation over the protein extract range of 0.12–0.5 μg/mL. Moreover, short term feeding of mice with Roquefort cheese (twice, 10 mg per mouse with an interval of 24 hours) led to the inhibition of the migration of peritoneal leukocytes caused by intraperitoneal injection of E. coli lipopolysaccharide. These changes were complemented by a reduction in neutrophil count and a relative increase in peritoneal macrophages, suggesting that ingestion of Roquefort could promote regenerative processes at the site of inflammation. The ability of this protein to inhibit propagation of Chlamydia infection, as well as the anti-inflammatory and proregenerative effects of Roquefort itself, may contribute to the low prevalence of cardiovascular mortality in France where consumption of fungal fermented cheeses is the highest in the world