Natuurlijk vetzuur CLA tegen diabetes.*
Natuurlijk CLA, een vetzuur dat gevonden wordt in zuivel, yoghurt, kaas en vlees blijkt uit een wetenschappelijk onderzoek met muizen blijkt dezelfde werking te hebben als medicijnen tegen diabetes-2. Natuurlijk CLA, geconjugeerd linolzuur wordt door bacteriën in herkauwers gevormd uit het linolzuur dat in gras zit. De werking van CLA is identiek aan die van medicijnen doch natuurlijk CLA heeft niet de bijwerkingen zoals dikker worden, integendeel zelfs.
Compound
In Dairy Products Targets Diabetes
Fatty
acids commonly found in dairy products have successfully treated diabetes in
mice, according to a researcher at Penn State. The compounds, known as
conjugated linoleic acids (CLA), have also shown promising results in human
trials, signaling a new way of potentially treating the disease without
synthetic drugs.
"The compounds are predominantly found in dairy products such as milk,
cheese and meat, and are formed by bacteria in ruminants that take linoleic
acids - fatty acids from plants - and convert them into conjugated linoleic
acids, or CLA," says Jack Vanden Heuvel, professor of molecular toxicology
in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences and co-director of Penn State's
Center of Excellence in Nutrigenomics.
Researchers first became interested in CLA when it was shown to inhibit a
variety of cancers such as breast, skin and colon in mice, and further research
showed effects on circulating cholesterol and inflammation. These effects are
the same as the newest generation of synthetic drugs used to treat diabetes in
humans.
These synthetic drugs act by triggering a set of nuclear receptors called PPAR.
In addition to being targets for a variety of clinically effective drugs, PPARs
belong to a large family of proteins, and their biological purpose is to sense
fatty acids and fatty acid metabolites within the cell, says Vanden Heuvel.
When the synthetic drugs interact with these protein receptors, it turns the
receptor "on," making it an active form of the protein, which then
interacts with DNA and regulates gene expression. This increases the enzymes
that process fatty acids and also increases the tissues' sensitivity to insulin.
"We wondered if CLA was using the same mechanism, in which case it could be
used as an anti-diabetes drug," Vanden Heuvel says.
To test the idea, he used CLA on mice prone to adult onset (Type-2) diabetes.
Results indicated that the mice had an improvement in insulin action, and a
decrease in circulating glucose. Also, the mechanism was indeed similar to that
of the drugs.
"Anti-diabetes drugs act the same way. They mimic the natural activators of
the receptors by getting into the cell and interacting with the PPARs to
regulate glucose and fat metabolism," says Vanden Heuvel.
Early human trials indicate that when administered for longer than 8 weeks, CLA
improves the body's misregulation of insulin and lowers the level of glucose in
the blood in patients with adult onset, or Type-2 diabetes, the most common form
of this disease.
However, Vanden Heuvel cautions that while having a diet that is high in dairy
and meat products, and thereby CLA, might have a health benefit, one must also
be aware of other lipids present in these products, such as trans fatty acids.
Instead, he suggests that in addition to a well-balanced diet, it is
advantageous to incorporate CLA as a dietary supplement, or to seek out new
products that enrich foods such as butter, margarine and ice cream with CLA.
"Adult-onset diabetes is fast becoming an epidemic and is largely
associated with poor diet and nutrition and other lifestyle issues," Vanden
Heuvel says. The reason for the increase in diabetes may have to do with the
ratio of so-called "good" and "bad" fats, with the average
American diet containing too much of the "bad" fats. CLA, whose effect
is very similar to fish oil, a source of "good" fat, could prove
beneficial against Type-2 diabetes.
"And compared to the synthetic drugs used to treated this disease, CLA does
not cause weight gain and may in fact decrease overall body fat," says
Vanden Heuvel, who has been granted a patent on the new method of treating
diabetes with CLA.
###
Other researchers on the patent include Martha Belury, Ohio State University,
and Louise Peck, University of Washington, for the work initially conducted at
Purdue University.
(Aug. 2006) (Opm. Er is een groot gezondheidsverschil tussen natuurlijk en onnatuurlijke transvetten, meer uitleg kijk hier.)