Supplement

• • Definition: a product taken by mouth that contains a ‘dietary ingredient’ intended to supplement the diet
  • Dietary ingredient: vitamins, minerals, herbs, amino acid, substances (e.g. enzyme, glandular, metabolites)
• Reason for taking supplements

  • Compensate the perceived/ potential inadequacy in the diet to avoid dietary deficiency disease
  • Thiamin: Beriberi; Vitamin C: Scurvy; Vitamin D: Rickets
  • Treat/ prevent non-deficiency disease in a safer and more natural manner
  • Evening primrose oil: Pre-menstrual syndrome; Calcium: Osteoporosis; Plant pigment: Cancer, Heart disease
  • Improve athletic performance
• Functional Foods

   

  • Coined in Japan in the early 1980s:

  ·      Foods that encompass potentially healthful products (including modified food/ ingredient); may provide a health benefit; beyond the traditional nutrients it contains
• • Different terms for functional foods:

  HK: Health foods

  China: Health foods

  Korea: Therapeutic foods

  Japan: Foods of Specified Health Use

  Europe & USA: Dietary supplement; Functional foods; Nutraceuticals; Designer foods; Pharmafoods
• 1. Broccoli and other Cruciferous vegetables (Glucosinolate): Cancer-preventing
  2. Fruit (e.g. orange, kiwi): Antioxidant, Flavonoids
  3. Chocolate: Polyphenol
  4. Red wine: Polyphenol [may bring more harm > benefit]
  5. Berry fruits: Anthocyanin
• Metabolic activity = Virtual organ

  • Partially digest nutrients e.g. Lactose & Fibre (esp. non-digestible material)
  • Synthesize vitamin (e.g. Vitamin K; half produced by gut microbe)
  • Immune response modulation
  • Normal CNS development
  • Reduce incidence of infection
• Prebiotic bacteria

  • Colonize gut
  • Natural barrier barrier
  • Protect against pathogens
• Microbiota in health & disease

  • Higher microbiome diversity = Good for health
  • Healthy gut: 300-500 different bacterial species; >10000 strains
  • Imbalance of gut microbiota --> Irritable bowel syndrome, Colitis, Diabetes, Obesity

  ·      Reversible by diet; Take probiotics
• Lactobacilli

  • Produce lactic acid
  • Reproduce quickly; Fill up space; Limit space for bad microbes
  • Lower pH pf gut
  • e.g. L. acidophilius: Resistant to acid (Survive in stomach acid --> Large intestine); Production of acidophilin
• Bifidobacteria

  • Dominant GI bacteria in breast - fed babies
  • Lower GI & Respiratory infection rate
  • Promoted by bifidus factor
• Potential benefit of probiotics

  1. Antibiotic-associated diarrhea (AAD)

  Significant therapeutic efficiacy for S. boulardii in the prevention of AAD

  2. Traveller’s diarrhea (TD)

  Probiotics significantly prevent TD

  3. Acute infectious diarrhea

  Significantly reduce the duration of the diarrhea especially those associated rotavirus

  4. Necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC)

  • Probiotics reduce risk of NEC

  5. Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS)
• Phytosterol

  • Definition: Plant based steroid compounds
  • Poorly absorbed from the gut (e.g. β - sitosterol: 5%; β - sitostanol: <1%)
• Phytosterol function

  • Inhibit the absorption of dietary cholesterol + reabsorption of biliary cholesterol
  • By displacing cholesterol from micelles in the gut
• If phytosterol present:

  • Content in micelle = Cholesterol + Phytosteroid
  • Less cholesterol absorbed
• Phytosterol & Cholesterol

  • Mildly hypercholesterolemia eat sitostanol enriched margarine

  per day for a year = Lower cholesterol level

  • Regular intake of phytosterol (2 g/ day) = Lower cholesterol level; Reduce risk of CVD

  --> Clinical trials of phytosterol and LDL cholesterol level

  • Potential reduced risk
• --> Food source of phytosterol

  • Naturally found in all plants
  • Daily supply of plant sterol in a typical Western diet: 150 – 400 mg
  • Fortified in a variety of food products

  ·      Margarine (3 g of stanol ester per 25 g of margarine)
• • Free radicals are produced:

  ·      By-product of normal oxidative process in cell

  ·      Detoxification

  ·      During oxygen-haemoglobin dissociation

  ·      Killing microorganism by neutrophil leukocyte

  ·      Env. stress (e.g. Smoking, Ionizing radiation, Tanning lamp, Chemicals)
• Free radical

  • Highly reactive molecule that can damage DNA, cell membrane, protein; oxidize cholesterol & speed up aging
  • Unpaired electron = Reactive; pair up; Steal electron from other molecules to pair up
  • Free radical theory of disease: Oxidative damage is a major cause of chronic disease
• • Antioxidants: neutralize free radicals
  • Humans have built-in antioxidant system in our body

  ·      Superoxide dismutase, Glutathione peroxidase, Catalase, Glutathione reductase,   Co-enzyme Q10

  • In diet: Vitamin C & E, Carotenoid, Flavonoid, Polyphenol
  • Some can act as pro-oxidants; depending on condition
•  

  Fish oil/ omega 3 Fatty acid

  • Polyunsaturated FA w/ the first double bond is between carbon 3 & 4
• Omega 3

  • linolenic acid (18: 3 ω 3); EPA (20: 5 ω 3); DHA (22: 5 ω 3)
  • Ratio of ω-6: ω-3 in the diets of hunter-gathers: 4 - 5: 1 [of ω-6: ω-3 = 4-5:1]

  • Standard American Diet: 10 - 30 (too much ω-6; too little ω-3)
• 2 main types of essential PUFA

  1. omega 6
  2. omega 3
• --> Omega-3 FA and Heart disease

  • Might be beneficial only for people who do not eat fish