What are the best dietary choices to maximize chances for conception in both men and women?
According to a recent article in Nutrition & Food Science the strongest factor affecting fertility is being either overweight or underweight. You can use a BMI (body mass index) calculator to check if you are overweight or underweight. The results may surprise you! The article states that testosterone and body weight have an inverse relationship in men. In other words, the more you weigh, the less testosterone you produce. So maintaining a healthy weight is particularly important for men. In terms of nutrients both zinc and folate have been identified as increasing fertility for both men and women. Zinc is particularly important for men. Click here for the top ten foods highest in zinc.
Are there any other factors?
A recent study on the effects of dairy and fertility published in the journal of Human Reproduction found that women who consume low fat dairy products (skim milk, low fat cheese, etc) are twice as likely to experience infertility compared to those who consume full fat products. One, however, should not start eating butter in the hopes of increasing fertility and should still approach high fat dairy foods with caution. Instead, one can look to consume a diet higher in healthier fats such as seeds and nuts.
A recent article in Current Nutrition & Food Science has pointed out that “open leaf” type lettuces such as romaine are much richer in nutrients than crisp head types, like ice bergs. The main reason for this difference is the ability of the leaves to absorb light, and thereby synthesize more vitamins. Take a look at the nutrient profile comparison of romaine lettuce to ice-berg.
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Complete nutrient comparison of Romaine vs. Ice-berg/Crisp Head Lettuces
Here we see that romaine contains over 10 times the vitamin A and over 8 times the vitamin C content. Further, the romaine lettuce also contains more protein, dietary fiber, calcium, and iron.
The same phenomenon also holds true for cabbage, take a look at a comparison of Collard Greens (open leaf cabbage) vs. a typical head of cabbage :
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Complete nutrient comparison of Collard Greens vs. Cabbage
While the amounts of vitamin C and Iron are slightly higher in cabbage, the collards still maintain higher protein levels, about 3 times the calcium, and over 50 times the vitamin A. The rule of thumb is to choose and prepare the outer dark green leaves of all leaf vegetables you consume.
Parmesan cheese is a food high in protein, calcium, and vitamin b12 making it one of the best choices for cheese around. Just be sure not to eat too much due to its high calorie and saturated fat content.
The ingredients in tradition Parmesan are:
milk
skim milk
rennet (culture agent to curdle the milk to cheese)
salt
and that is it.
Variants can include other enzymes and anti-caking agents in the shredded version to keep the cheese from clumping. These typically are calcium sulfate or potassium sulfate. Which add extra potassium and calcium. If possible try to located Parmesan cheese which is low in sodium (salt).
The amount of protein you should eat is a factor of your goals in nutrition. For the sake of argument, this article will assume that you want to know how much protein to eat to minimize your risk of cancer and aging, and not to build massive amounts of muscle.
According to a recent publication out of Washington University St. Louis a low-protein diet reduces levels of a hormone called IGF1 in the blood. IGF1 is theorized to play a key role in regulation of aging and cancer risk. Most animals on a calorie restricted diet experience a decline in IGF1 levels in line with an increase in life-span and health span. They are literally younger for longer. The same reduction in IGF1 only occurred in humans on a protein restricted diet, and not on a calorie restricted diet alone. In order to receive the benefit of a decline in IGF1 levels the participants ate 0.76 grams per kilo-gram of body weight, still above the median required intake of 0.65 g/kg body weight, but way down from the 1.34g/kg body weight that the average American male is eating.
What is the bottom line? Eat less protein for your body weight. What should the serving sizes be? Well that depends on your body weight. The serving sizes below are for a 150 pound (68 kg) person, who should eat 50 grams of protein per day.
This means that assuming you get no protein from other sources eg: grains, vegetables, etc…per day you should eat no more than:
2 chicken legs (~52g protein)
6 cups of skim milk (~50g protein) (those are measuring cups or 8 ounces)
3 pork chops (~55g protein)
2 cans of tuna (~51g protein)
10 cups of cooked brown rice (~50g protein)
3 cups cooked lentils (~53g protein)
4 cups cooked black beans (~58g protein)
14 slices of whole grain bread (~49g protein)
8 eggs (~50g protein)
1.5 cups of whole almonds (~45g protein)
And remember, these numbers are assuming that is all you are eating. When you eat these foods in combination you need even less! So reduce portion size always!
The brain is a very compicated organ of which understanding is still its infancy. Little is known about how most headache medicines act on the brain, other than that they stop pain with no apparent damaging effects. It should therefore be taken with caution when people make adamant statements that alcohol kills brain cells. Long term studies have shown that moderate consumption of alcohol does not kill brain cells, or damage the brain in any way that is not quickly reversible. Studies have even shown that moderate consumption of alcohol can enhance cognitive functioning.
It should be noted that long term abuse of alcohol will cause irreversable damage on your brain, as well as much of your body, and is still a very bad idea.
Brewers Yeast is a rich source of nutrients, typically used for making beer, but can also be used to make breads and other consumables.
There are conflicting reports on how much vitamin B12 brewers yeast provides. The University of Maryland Medical Center states that it provides no B-12. However, the nutrition facts from Now Foods lists a whopping 3 micrograms (50% RDA) of vitamin B12 in two tablespoons on bewers yeast. This is way more B12 than what you can get from Marmite or other yeast extracts.
So, as ever with nutrition facts, it is best to buy a product where you can consult the label for specific B12 content. One should also be cautious on counting on the yeast as a sole source for vitamin B12.
Sugar is controversial now. Yet lots of people stand by it. “What is the big deal?” they say. As with epidemiology it is always difficult to prove direct effects in humans. People are complicated, they have different genes, different lifestyle habits. Some smoke, some run marathons, some live in cities with smog, some are in the country by animal waste. All this makes it difficult to find a direct effect between nutrition and health.
In the case of blood sugar, we need to look at what we know about how the body works. First, when blood sugar is high your pancreas releases insulin so the excess sugar (glucose) can be absorbed by fat cells in your body. Conversely, when your blood sugar is low, the pancreas realses glucagon which signals the liver to release glucose in the blood. Both insulin and glucagen are hormonal signals, which send messages to your body. They are bound to have more than one function, and indeed as we have seen earlier, insluin is also important in making you feel hungry. This is part of the reason why a person will usually feels hungry after eating high sugar foods.
So how does all this relate to health and aging? Well first off, if your blood sugar is consistently high from eating high sugar foods then your body eventually becomes less and less responsive to the insulin, precipitating a condition known as type II diabetes.
Further, caloric restriction is probably the most famous intervention known to extend healthy years of life and “preserve youth”. While it is still not known how caloric restriction does this, one of the main theories is that by starving the body, insulin sensitivity increases. In other words, it takes less insulin to keep blood sugar in line, and this in turn slows down the aging of your body.
Could you ask for a better reason to eat lettuce instead of candy?
A reader recently asked the question of how vitamin C prevents Scurvy. To answer this question for everyone, it is first important to understand what scurvy is. Scurvy is a disease wherein the body cannot create enough collagen due to a lack of vitamin C. Basically, your body cannot manufacture the connective tissue which holds your organs and teeth in place, and cushions your joints.
So the short answer to the question is that vitamin C plays a rather critical role in how your body makes collagen (connective tissue). Vitamin C, like other vitamins, is a catalyst, a molecule that helps chemical reactions occur with less time and effort. While this article will not delve into the exact biochemistry of how the body produces collagen, it should be noted that vitamin C hydroxialtes two amino acids (the building blocks of life) proline and lysine which then go on to create collagen. (All being well).
A recent editorial in The American Journal of Clincal Nutrition suggests that large scale studies on diet and cancer show little to no link between eating red meat and breast cancer in women who are past adolescence. The study did caution that the degree and heat used to cook the meat was not taken into account, since burning of meat, or any food, is currently considered to be a “no-no” when it comes to cancer. Put the grills on low, or away.
Of course, the whole problem with cancer in epidemiology is that it is hard to study the effect of food for more than a 10-20 year period, since there are so many other factors that can be taking place. People are bad lab animals in other words. You can’t isolate them and control for single factors, and so the cancer link is always a challenge which is what leads to all the mixed news, as we know.
At the end of the editorial the authors did still urge that red meat intake be limited, citing increased risk to heart disease and cancer. Sage advice, though it goes without saying that almost any food should be limited.
The antioxidant craze has taken hold in recent years, and while everyone knows they should be eating fruits, vegetables, and grains to get their antioxidants, hard core health types are always seeking specific numbers to know which vegetables packs the most anti-degenerative disease power.
In a recent study out of the Journal of Nutrition and Food Science four non-leafy vegetables were analyzed for their antioxidant capacity. Their antioxidant capacity was measured as the amount of phenolic, ascorbic acid (vitamin C), and beta-carotene present in the vegetables. This capacity was combined to create a single “antioxidant score” and the results are as follows:
- String Beans – 85
- Winged Beans – 75
- French Beans – 72
- Snow Peas – 55
How are these values measured? First samples of each of the vegetables are ground up, put in ethanol, shaken, and then filtered to create an extract which can be analyzed. The extract mixture is frozen to maintain its integrity, and then added to a spectroscopy machine, or a machine that can identity certain chemicals in the extract. The machine spits out a raw “score” and that is that.
Despite the ranking above, the paper cites that there was no statistically significant difference in the antioxidant capacity of the four vegetables. The truth of the matter is that antioxidant capacity of foods is still difficuilt to work out and measure. If you don’t believe me, take a look at the U.S. Governments attempt to measure “Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity” of select foods…
