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Postprandial Effects of Mixed Spices on Peripheral Blood Mononuclear Cells (PBMC’s) Gene Expressions associated with Lipid Metabolism and Inflammatory Responses in Humans: A Randomized Crossover Study

Xue, Congyu (2017) MOBT01 20162
Degree Projects in Molecular Biology
Popular Abstract
Cooking with culinary spices shows health benefits

Every time we eat a meal, our body will turn into a post-meal state and face a lot of challenges induced by the food intake. These challenges include blood glucose spikes, triggered inflammation and increased total cholesterol concentrations. If these challenges happen too many times a day and reach an abnormal level, then there is a risk of developing chronic diseases, like Type 2 Diabetes. Therefore, we tried to determine how cooking with culinary spices can help our body to achieve a balanced and normal post-meal state.

Recent studies indicate that polyphenols, known as phytochemicals abundantly found in plants, help normalize post-meal lipid oxidation and inflammatory responses... (More)
Cooking with culinary spices shows health benefits

Every time we eat a meal, our body will turn into a post-meal state and face a lot of challenges induced by the food intake. These challenges include blood glucose spikes, triggered inflammation and increased total cholesterol concentrations. If these challenges happen too many times a day and reach an abnormal level, then there is a risk of developing chronic diseases, like Type 2 Diabetes. Therefore, we tried to determine how cooking with culinary spices can help our body to achieve a balanced and normal post-meal state.

Recent studies indicate that polyphenols, known as phytochemicals abundantly found in plants, help normalize post-meal lipid oxidation and inflammatory responses via their antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. Spices have the highest polyphenol concentrations of all foods and they are easily accessible seasoning ingredients. More importantly, having a meal containing different types of spices is associated with increased antioxidant levels and anti-inflammatory properties in humans. As a result, we selected five polyphenol-rich spices and tried to investigate how eating a high-calorie meal enriched in dietary fat seasoned with or without the mix of these spices affected people’s post-meal health states on both gene expression and lipid panel levels.

We performed a clinical study involving eighteen healthy participants and they were instructed to consume one unseasoned meal and one seasoned meal randomly selected during two separate visits. Blood samples were collected at fasting and at several time points after the meal to perform biochemistry and clinical measurements. Gene expression levels were determined by a certain type of blood cells, called peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs), which can be easily extracted and contain much important information for us to study with.

The results were promising in different aspects. First, the so-called ‘good cholesterol’- high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) was significantly higher after eating the seasoned meal compared to the unseasoned meal. Second, a significantly lower insulin level was observed after the seasoned meal, which is important for balancing post-meal glucose levels. Third, the gene expression changes showed that the seasoned meal activated several genes involved in normalizing cholesterol concentrations and suppressed several genes involved in triggering post-meal inflammation. In summary, after eating a high-calorie meal enriched with dietary fat and seasoned with a mix of spices, improved anti-inflammatory properties, balanced insulin and cholesterol concentrations on both gene expression and lipid panel levels were observed in healthy people. Therefore, cooking with polyphenol-rich spices shows health benefits for maintaining a normal and balanced post-meal state and thereby reduce the risk of developing chronic diseases.

Master’s Degree Project in Molecular Biology, Molecular genetics and Biotechnology 60 credits 2017.05
Department of Biology, Lund University

Advisor: Elin Östman and Yoghatama Cindya Zanzer
Food for Health Science Centre, Lund University (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
Xue, Congyu
supervisor
organization
course
MOBT01 20162
year
type
H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
subject
language
English
id
8925271
date added to LUP
2017-09-11 12:02:21
date last changed
2017-09-11 12:02:21
@misc{8925271,
  author       = {{Xue, Congyu}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  title        = {{Postprandial Effects of Mixed Spices on Peripheral Blood Mononuclear Cells (PBMC’s) Gene Expressions associated with Lipid Metabolism and Inflammatory Responses in Humans: A Randomized Crossover Study}},
  year         = {{2017}},
}