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SCIENCE NEWS, 3/18/00, vol. 18, p. 188-189
CHOCOLATE HEARTS
- YUMMY AND GOOD MEDICINE
More than 35 million heart-shaped
boxes of chocolate changed hands in the United States on Valentine's Day
this year. The holiday's total chocolate sales approached $1 billion.
Yet this confection's link to hearts is extending beyond the lucrative
candy business.
Chocolate and cocoa powders are derived from beams that contain hefty
quantities of natural antioxidants called flavonoids. In recent years,
research has correlated consumption of tea, red wine, and other foods
rich in these compounds with a reduced risk of cardiovascular disease.
Realizing that this observation might transform chocolate's reputation
from junk food into health-promoting snack candy companies and the American
Cocoa Research Institute (ACRI) in McLean, Va., have begun pumping money
into studies of chocolate's antioxidants.
Those investments now hint at big payoffs. New findings - many reported
for the first time last month in Washington, D.C., at the annual meeting
of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) - suggest
that chocolate's chemistry confers cardiovascular benefits.
Though preliminary, the research indicates that cocoa and chocolates not
only contain natural compounds that can protect the heart and blood vessels
but also that the quantities present in commercial products may be sufficient
to exert measurable effects.
These studies are prompting manufacturers to reevaluate how they make
chocolate, since some techniques unintentionally eliminate flavonoids.
Mars, Inc., recently developed a proprietary process to preserve flavonoids.
By next month, the company plans to be labeling U.S. products made with
the process, which they call Cocoapro. Then, observes Harold H. Schmitz,
Mars' director of nutrition and analytical services in Hackettstown, N.J.,
consumers can identify chocolates retaining much of a cocoa bean's initial
flavonoid riches.
A 40-gram serving of milk chocolate typically contains around 400 milligrams
of antioxidants, about the same quantity as a glass of red wine, according
to research published last year by Joe A. Vinson of the University of
Scranton (Pa.). Dark chocolate aficionados will be happy to learn that
a serving of their favorite contains more than twice that quantity - roughly
the same amount as a cup of black tea. Unsweetened powdered cocoa starts
out with almost twice as much of these antioxidants as dark chocolate.
But to make a cup of hot chocolate, the cocoa is diluted with water or
milk and sugar, so the flavonoid total per serving plummets to about half
of that present in milk chocolate.
At least as important as the total amount of flavonoids, however, is the
potency of these antioxidants, Vinson notes. And the potency of those
in chocolate is impressive, his team reported in the December 1999 JOURNAL
OF AGRICULTURAL AND FOOD CHEMISTRY.
Vinson and his colleagues found that, matched molecule for molecule, chocolate's
flavonoids are more powerful than vitamins such as ascorbic acid in limiting
the oxidation of cholesterol circulating in low-density lipoproteins (LDLs)
and very-low-density lipoproteins. Arteriosclerosis studies have suggested
that oxidation of these lipoproteins is an essential step in the creation
of artery-clogging plaque.
Vinson, whose work was supported by ACRI, doesn't know which chocolate
products the institute gave him to test or the complex mix of flavonoids
within them.
Yet individual flavonoids - some 4,000 have been identified in plant products
so far - vary not only in potency but also in mode of action. The primary
family of flavonoids contributing to the antioxidant prowess of chocolates
is the procyanidins, notes Schmitz. Their basic unit is a three ring molecular
structure. The mature cocoa bean contains pairs known as dimers, triads
known as trimers, quartets known as tetramers, and larger ensembles of
these units.
Test-tube studies by German scientists recently showed that chocolate's
tetramers were the top performers among this group in curbing the type
of oxidation that free radicals can wreak in blood vessel walls. That's
potentially important, Schmitz notes, because such naturally occurring
radicals can inflame vessels, a process that fosters a dangerous rupturing
of arteriosclerotic plaque (SN: 2/6 99, p. 86).
Chocolate's tetramers and larger procyanidins also help relax the inner
surface of blood vessels according to studies in isolated tissues headed
by C. Tissa Kappagoda of the University of California, Davis School of
Medicine.
This relaxation "is a major player in vascular health," he explains.
People in whom it's absent or grossly impaired often have high blood pressure,
arteriosclerosis, or other symptoms of cardiovascular disease.
In healthy blood vessels, Kappagoda noted at the AAAS meeting, much of
this relaxation is controlled by the production of nitric oxide (SIN 3/23/96,
p. 180). His research, funded by Mars, indicates that chocolate's compounds
exert their relaxing effect by increasing nitric oxide concentrations.
Test-tube studies by Schmitz's team at Mars dovetail with the findings
by both groups. Chocolate procyanidins can dampen the activity of enzymes
that trigger inflammation and ratchet up production of nitric oxide, Schmitz
reported at the meeting. Moreover he notes, both of these actions may
be independent of the flavonoids' antioxidant role.
Yet Cesar G. Fraga of the University of Buenos Aires hails the procyanidins'
antioxidant activity. In work funded by Mars, he has demonstrated a rise
of chocolate-derived procyanidins in the blood of men and women who had
just eaten semi-sweet chocolate candies. His team found that blood sampled
2 hours after candy consumption protected its circulating lipids from
oxidation. The more chocolate eaten, the better the protection.
Earlier test-tube studies, he says, indicate that the procyanidins may
function as a first line of defense against damaging oxidants - sparing
vitamin C and other antioxidant vitamins that would otherwise be destroyed
in the battle. In these experiments, while all of the tested procyanidins
appeared active, the pentamer offered the best protection.
Nutritionist Carl L. Keen, Fraga's collaborator at UC Davis, has conducted
additional Mars-funded work. At the AAAS meeting, he unveiled data from
new studies indicating that flavonoid rich foods may benefit the heart
yet another way, by damping the reactivity of blood platelets.
When stimulated by any of several chemical triggers, these cells turn
sticky, helping blood to clot. Doctors often recommend that people at
risk of heart attacks take aspirins to reduce clotting. Keen's data now
show that chocolate's procyanidins work like especially mild aspirins.
His group gave water, procyanidin-rich cocoa, or alcohol-free red wine
to groups of 10 men and women. The researchers sampled and tested the
volunteers' blood 2 and 6 hours later.
Though both the wine and cocoa significantly delayed the blood's clotting
time, only the cocoa protected blood platelets from fragmentation. Platelets
tend to fragment when they become overly sticky, Keen says.
At the Experimental Biology meeting in San Diego next month, Penny Kris-Etherton
and her colleagues at Pennsylvania State University in State College,
who are funded by ACRI, plan to report yet another cardiovascular benefit.
In the 24 volunteers whom they studied, diets enriched with dark chocolate
or cocoa powder raised the individuals' high-density lipoprotein (HDL)
cholesterol, the so-called good cholesterol.
"This is important," Kris-Etherton says, "because a higher
ratio of HDLs to LDLs is associated with a decreased risk of heart disease."
Why should consumers trust
the tantalizing data on chocolate if they're all coming from industry-funded
research? 'That's a valid question," acknowledges nutritionist John
W. Erdman of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who co-chaired
the AAAS symposium on chocolate. Though he believes people should be skeptical,
he also points out that these studies would never get off the ground without
candy industry financing.
Erdman likens the situation to Quaker Oats' funding of research that laid
the foundation for studies that proved oats' ability to lower serum cholesterol.
Similarly, soy producers funded most of the initial work showing that
proteins and antioxidants in their crops could fight heart disease. When
it comes to potential neutraceuticals - foods offering health benefits
- publication of a critical mass of promising, peer-reviewed, industry-financed
studies appears necessary before the government will step in with financial
support, Erdman says.
While U.S. chocolate makers would love to be able to adorn their labels
with health claims, Schmitz says that "a lot of research needs to
be done before we get to that point."
If that ever happens, chocolate will have come full circle, says Louis
E. Grivetti, a nutritional historian at UC Davis. His research team is
documenting extensive medicinal use of chocolate and cocoa that dates
back at least 500 years throughout Europe and the Americas. Healers used
them to treat dozens of conditions, including tuberculosis, anemia, gastrointestinal
upset, and kidney stones.
Concludes Norman K. Hollenberg of Harvard Medical School in Boston who
co-chaired the AAAS symposium, "the issue [today] isn't should we
or should we not be recommending chocolate. The fact is, we are eating
chocolate" - more than 12 pounds per person in the United States
each year. The new data suggest that unless we overindulge, says Hollenberg,
"people should not feel guilty about eating it."
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