For people who like mushrooms, now there is one reason to add the vegetable to meals: slowing down aging.
Mushrooms are more popular in European countries like France and Italy than in the U.S.
Interestingly, in these countries, the rates of Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease are lower compared to that in the U.S.
Is there any association between the two things? Probably.
A recent study from Penn State University finds that mushrooms are full of antioxidants that could help delay aging.
The study is published in Food Chemistry.
The researchers mention a theory of aging that when we oxidize our food to produce energy, there’s several free radicals are side products of that action and many of these are quite toxic.
These toxic radicals can cause oxidative stress.
The body has its own way to control most of free radicals, but eventually these free radicals can cause damage in cells, proteins and even DNA.
That is why older people suffer from many diseases of aging, like cancer, coronary heart disease, Alzheimer’s disease.
Two antioxidants high in mushrooms, ergothioneine and glutathione, are important for the body to control the toxic radicals.
In the study, the researchers tested the amounts of the two antioxidants in 13 types of mushroom, and they found that the amounts varied greatly between mushroom species.
Among all the mushrooms, the porcini has the highest amounts of antioxidants.
More common mushrooms, such as white button mushrooms, have lower antioxidants, but are still higher than other foods.
The researchers suggest that there is no doubt that mushrooms are the highest dietary source of these two antioxidants taken together.
Furthermore, cook methods seem to have little impact on the antioxidant amounts in mushrooms because these antioxidants are quite stable.
It seems eating more such antioxidants may lead to lower risk of neurodegenerative diseases, but the team suggests that more research is needed to test the direct causal relations.
Besides antioxidants ergothioneine and glutathione, mushrooms are also rich in spermidine, a compound that may to prevent the most common type of liver cancer and prolong life.
The study is published in the journal Cancer Research.
It shows that animals that ate supplement of spermidine could live longer and were less likely to have liver tumors.
In addition, mushrooms may people maintain a healthy body weight.
One study published in Appetite finds that using mushrooms to replace meat could help control weight.
The study tested the differences with satiety and a 10-day food intake between mushrooms and meat.
They found that eating a mushroom-rich breakfast may result in less hunger and a greater feeling of fullness compared to a meat-rich breakfast.
This means if you replace meat with mushrooms in your breakfast, you feel fuller and may eat less in your next meal.
The researchers suggest that mushrooms may aid weight management and satiety, and thus contribute to overall wellness.
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