Foods to Protect the Heart

Plant-based antioxidants – compounds that can beneficially affect some types of cell damage, flavonoids are found abundantly in blueberries, dark chocolate, and red wine.  Jia Zhong, from Harvard School of Public Health (Massachusetts, USA), and colleagues studied data collected on 573 men enrolled in the Boston-based Normative Aging Study, collecting and tracking heart rate variability and exposure to fine particulate matter over an 11-year period.  Observing that the men tended to suffer from reduced  heart rate variability when smog levels rose for 48 hours, the effect was even more pronounced for those men whose genetics tended to suppress a protein called toll-like receptor 2, which detects foreign substances and passes on signals to the immune system. However, air pollution and genetics had a significantly weaker effect among those subjects who consumed high levels of flavonoids.  The study authors submit that: “high flavonoid intake emolliates the hazardous effect of pollution, likely through regulating [toll-like receptor 2] methylation.”