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Defining Food Components as New Nutrients

Article  in  Journal of Nutrition · October 1994


DOI: 10.1093/jn/124.suppl_9.1789S · Source: PubMed

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Food Composition

Defining Food Components as New Nutrients12


SUZANNE HENDRICH,3 KWANG-WON LEE, XIA Xü, HÜEI-JÜWANG
AND PATRICIA A. MURPHY
Food Science & Human Nutrition, Iowa State University, Ames, ¡A50011

is defined most stringently as a dietary compound


ABSTRACT When obtained from a usual diet, a food which is required for life, and for which no other com
component that sustains or enhances physiological pound can substitute. A less stringent definition in
functions and/or prevents diseases is a nutrient. Iso- cludes the concept of conditional essentiality: that a
flavones, tocotrienols, and carotenoids are candidate dietary compound may be required at a certain stage
nutrients which may be of health benefit to humans by
inhibiting cancer development and reducing risk of ath of the life cycle or in certain disease states. In the
erosclerosis. The amounts of some of these candidate broadest sense, nutrients are food components which

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nutrients in foods are known. A carotenoid data base maintain human health when consumed in amounts
has been developed. Isoflavone content of soy foods found in a usual diet. Under this broadest definition,
ranges from 0.1 mg/g (soymilk) to 2.5 mg/g (soy pro nutrients may include a variety of food components
tein isolate). Human bioavailability studies have also
been performed with these candidate nutrients. For ex which can also be made by the body, such as glucose,
ample, in young adult females fed a single meal con glutathione, and cholesterol. Dietary fibers would also
taining soy milk, isoflavones were cleared from urine be nutrients to the extent to which they can be fer
within 24 h after feeding, with about 15-20% of the mented to produce absorbable energy-yielding prod
total dose accounted for in urine and feces. The two ucts. Because health maintenance includes the pre
major soy isoflavones, genistein and daidzein, differ in vention of aging and age-related diseases such as ath
bioavailability, with daidzein being more readily ex
creted in urine. Isoflavones, tocotrienols, and carot erosclerosis, cancer, and osteoporosis, numerous
enoids meet several criteria for classification as nu dietary compounds deserve attention as candidate nu
trients. But after appropriate animal testing, food anal trients. Such food components as carotenoids which
yses, and availability studies have been performed, are not vitamin A precursors (non-A carotenoids), to
human health-protective efficacy must be proven in
long-term feeding trials, in order for potential health- cotrienols, and isoflavonoids may be defined as nu
enhancing food components to be classified as trients if they are efficacious in reducing disease in
nutrients. J. Nutr. 124: 1789S-1792S, 1994. cidence and/or severity in long-term human trials
where the purified compounds are fed in amounts
INDEXING KEY WORDS: found commonly in foods. All of these classes of com
•isoflauones •soybeans •carotenoids pounds are antioxidants. The underlying mechanisms
•tocotrienols •bioauailability •carcinogenesis of health-protective effects of antioxidants are elusive,
•atherosclerosis •food analysis and clearly deserve much attention. It will also be nec-
1Presented at the "W. O. Atwater Centennial Celebration Sym
posium" held June 2-4, 1993 in Washington, D.C. The symposium
was sponsored by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Inter
national Life Sciences Institute and the American Institute of Nu
trition. Additional funding for this publication was provided by:
The core of classical nutrition research has been to Kellogg Company and the National Live Stock and Meat Board.
identify and characterize food components as nu Guest Editors for this supplement were: Gerald F. Combs, University
of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg, Mississippi and Walter Mertz,
trients. Innumerable food components remain to be Agricultural Research Service, Beltsville, Maryland.
characterized. The future of nutrition research will 2 Supported in part by the Iowa Agriculture Experiment Station,
continue to require the identification of new nutrients: Ames, IA, Proj. No. 2844, The Iowa State University Center for
nutrients which maintain human health. Health Designing Foods to Improve Nutrition, Iowa Soybean Promotion
Board, and NIH grant CA-56308-02.
maintenance is the key not only to human health, but 3To whom correspondence should be addressed: Suzanne Hen-
to human culture's economic sustenance, and the hu
drich, Ph., Food Science & Human Nutrition, Iowa State University,
man diet is central to health maintenance. A nutrient Ames, IA 50011.

0022-3166/94 $3.00 ©1994 American Institute of Nutrition.

1789S
1790S SUPPLEMENT

essary to show that usual diets and/or other compo in soy foods (mg/g), the isoflavones may be of great
nents in a food source of a candidate nutrient do not potential benefit to human health maintenance.
significantly antagonize or interfere with the health- Non-A carotenoids, tocotrienols, and isoflavones
protective effect of the candidate nutrient. Food com have been studied sufficiently to begin to estimate
ponents may exert health-promoting effects in phar whether the amounts of these components in the hu
macological doses, but the development of such com man food supply are sufficient to exert health-protec
pounds for use by the general public as prophylactic tive effects. The non-A carotenoid phytoene is an ef
Pharmaceuticals must be treated like other drugs. A fective suppressor of mouse skin carcinogenesis in a
clear distinction between food components as drugs dietary dose the equivalent of 24 mg/kg body weight
and as candidate nutrients is crucial to the establish (Mathews-Roth 1982). On the basis of body surface
ment of effective policies and distribution of public area, such a dose to humans would be approximately
resources to the pursuit of knowledge regarding new 2.4 mg/kg or about 150 mg of carotenoids per day for
nutrients. a human of average weight. Doses of 30 mg beta-car
The non-A carotenoid phytoene inhibits skin car- otene per day for 3 months reversed human oral leu-
cinogenesis in mice (Mathews-Roth 1982). Carot- koplakia (Garewal et al. 1990). Beta-carotene supple
enoids are abundantly distributed in plant foods ments of 50 mg every other day may prevent progres
(Mangels et al. 1993), and are readily available to the sion of human male cardiovascular disease (Gaziano
human body from usual diets (Micozzi et al. 1992). et al. 1991). Presuming that the effects of beta-carotene
Preliminary studies with beta-carotene supplementa are not simply due to its vitamin A activity, carot
tion suggest that amounts potentially obtainable from enoids may be health-protective when taken in phar

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the diet (25-30 mg/day) may lessen severity of human macological doses. Although it is possible to obtain
heart disease (Gaziano et al. 1991) and oral cancer large amounts of carotenoids from a few foods (e.g.,
(Garewal et al. 1990). These results justify the study carrots, spinach), a generous estimate of usual human
of non-A carotenoids to determine the molecular daily carotenoid intake would be approximately 6 mg.
characteristics needed for health protection. Doses of 6, 12, and 30 mg carotenoids from foods
Tocotrienols inhibit cholesterol synthesis by block given to human males over a 6-week period produced
ing hydroxymethylglutarylCoA reducÃ-ase(Qureshi et dose-related increases in total plasma carotenoid con
al. 1991a). These components of palm oil and of oat tent, verifying the bioavailability of carotenoids (Mi
and barley may be important factors in the cholesterol- cozzi et al. 1993). Although a food carotenoid data
lowering action of certain dietary fibers. The toco- base now exists, the reliability of a significant portion
trienols also inhibit ras oncogene products by blocking of the food data remains uncertain (Mangels et al.
their anchorage in cell membranes. 1993). Given the available evidence, controlled human
Isoflavonoids from soybeans may also be health feeding to determine specific health-protective effects
protectants. Genistin and daidzin and their aglycones, of diet-based amounts of non-A carotenoids should be
genistein and daidzein, are the major isoflavones in a high priority for future nutrition research funding.
soybeans (Murphy 1982). In addition to their anties- Tocotrienols are another important class of candi
trogenic activity (Adlercreutz et al. 1986, 1987), they date nutrients. As with carotenoids, feeding large
also possess antifungal (Nairn et al. 1974), antiviral, amounts of semipurified tocotrienols (200 mg/day) has
and antioxidant activities (Nairn et al. 1976). Anties- health-protective effects, lowering serum cholesterol
trogenic and antioxidant activities are proposed to be of hyperlipidemic humans (Qureshi et al. 199Ib).
anticarcinogenic. Feeding a 30% soybean diet has been Feeding trials in hyperlipidemic swine at doses equiv
shown to protect mouse liver from nitrosamine-in- alent to those in the human study also show choles
duced cancer (Fitzsimmons et al. 1989), although this terol-lowering effects of tocotrienols (Qureshi et al.
protective effect was not specifically attributable to 1991a). Rat studies of anticarcinogenic effects have
soybean isoflavones. Rats consuming a soy-based diet suggested some cancer-suppressive effects (Gould et
developed fewer mammary tumors following admin al 1991; Ngah et al. 1991) at doses of tocotrienols
istration of the carcinogens N-methylnitrosourea and equivalent to a human dose of about 10 mg/kg or sev
7,12-dimethylbenz[a]-anthracene than rats on isoni- eral hundred mg per day of tocotrienols. As with
trogenous and isocaloric diets without soy (Barnes et closely related alpha-tocopherol, anticarcinogenic ef
al. 1990). The anticarcinogenic effect of soy was prob fects in animals models generally only occur during
ably due to isoflavones. Genistein inhibits the growth feeding of massive doses; e.g., 20 g/kg of vitamin E
of estrogen receptor-negative and -positive human suppresses rat hepatocarcinogenesis (Ura et al. 1987).
breast cancer cell lines (IC50= 6.5-12.0 ¿ig/mL;Peter A usual human intake of tocotrienols may be approx
son et al. 1991). Genistein has also been shown to in imately 1 mg/day, based on Finnish estimates (Hei-
hibit tyrosine protein kinases (Akiyama et al. 1986) nonen and Piironen 1991). It remains to be determined
and to block angiogenesis (Fotsis et al. 1993), which whether dietary amounts of tocotrienols are of health
are also proposed mechanisms of anticarcinogenesis. benefit to humans, and the promise of such effects
Because of their biological effects and their abundance may not be as great as for carotenoids or isoflavonoids.
DEFINING FOOD COMPONENTS AS NEW NUTRIENTS 1791S

Isoflavonoids may be health-protective in amounts ponents potentially present in amounts which might
potentially available from a human diet containing be of human health benefit. Although more health-
daily soyfoods. This would require a significant change related animal data need to be obtained, the time is
in the usual U.S. diet. Preliminary rat studies suggest approaching when long-term human feeding trials of
that a dose of isoflavones equivalent, on the basis of purified isoflavones and foods containing isoflavones
surface area, to a human dose of 1.5-2.0 mg/kg per to examine health-related outcomes may be warranted.
day might suppress hepatocarcinogenesis. In rats ini Human foods are full of components which have
tiated with diethylnitrosamine (15 mg/kg body weight) not been fully characterized. Many of these compo
and promoted with 0.05% dietary phénobarbitalfor nents may be discovered to be health-protective nu
3 months, the volume of gamma-glutamyltransferase- trients. Standards for food analysis of such compo
positive hepatic preneoplastic foci was significantly nents need to be established. Mechanistic animal
suppressed by 80% in rats fed 240 mg crude isofla- studies which are extrapolatable to usual human in
vones/kg diet combined with phénobarbitalpromo takes are needed. Development of appropriate shorter-
tion (to be published). Significantly increased activity term biomarkers which can predict long-term health-
of hepatic eumene hydroperoxidase activity by isofla maintaining effects of food components is also crucial.
vone extract (at 240 mg isoflavones/kg diet) fed to rats Human bioavailability studies and, ultimately, where
for one week suggests a short-term marker of biolog evidence warrants sufficient optimism, long-term
ical effects of isoflavonoids (to be published), and per feeding trials of health-protective effects of candidate
haps of the related flavonoids, which might be adapt nutrients are essential, and should receive a significant

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able to studies of human blood cell enzyme activities portion of the resources committed to understanding
and potentially predictive of cancer-preventive effects and assuring human nutrition.
of these compounds.
The food content of isoflavones, generally 0.1-1
mg/g in soy foods, is known with some certainty, al LITERATURE CITED
though more standardization of methods is required.
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1792S SUPPLEMENT

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