喝红葡萄酒或可帮助减肥

近日，来自俄勒冈州立大学的研究人员通过研究表示，适量摄入红葡萄汁或红葡萄酒或可有效燃烧机体脂肪，从而改善过重个体的健康状况；研究者指出，消耗深色的葡萄，不管是食用还是引用葡萄汁或葡萄酒都会帮助个体很好地控制肥胖及其相关的代谢综合征，比如脂肪肝。

研究者Neil Shay表示，我们从圆叶葡萄中提取了四种天然化合物，并且在实验室利用人类肝脏和脂肪细胞进行研究，其中一种名为鞣花酸的化合物被证明具有潜在的作用，其可以明显减缓机体存在的脂肪细胞的生长并且抑制脂肪细胞的新生，同时也可以增强肝脏细胞的脂肪酸代谢。

许多的植物化合物并不是减肥的奇迹药物，但如果其可以增强脂肪的燃烧，尤其是促进肝脏对脂肪酸的代谢那么或可有效改善过重个体的肝脏功能；如果可以开发出一种饮食策略来减少个体肝脏中脂肪的有害积累，比如利用葡萄这种常见的水果，那么这对于有效抑制肥胖改善个体健康将非常重要。

文章中，研究者以小鼠为研究对象，分析了其机体的脂肪组织，研究者发现，小鼠机体细胞中负责代谢脂肪和糖类的两种蛋白：PPAR-α和PPARγ的表达活性较高；于是研究者假设，鞣花酸可以和其它化合物结合PPAR-α和PPARγ的细胞核激素受体，从而促进其开启特殊基因的表达，而这些特殊基因主要可以诱发机体膳食脂肪和葡萄糖的代谢，常见的降血糖和甘油三酯类的药物就是利用这种机制来发挥作用的。

最后研究者说道，我们的目的并不是替换必要的药物，而是指导患者选择常见广泛的食物来促进其机体的代谢功能及健康，目前研究者证实了适量摄入葡萄缺失可以帮助燃烧脂肪，促进脂肪酸代谢，相信研究者后期更多的研究将帮助开发有效控制体重，抑制疾病的新型疗法。

生物谷推荐的新闻阅读：

Drinking red grape juice or wine – in moderation – could improve the health of overweight people by helping them burn fat better, according to a new study coauthored by an Oregon State University researcher.

The findings suggest that consuming dark-colored grapes, whether eating them or drinking juice or wine, might help people better manage obesity and related metabolic disorders such as fatty liver.

Neil Shay, a biochemist and molecular biologist in OSU's College of Agricultural Sciences, was part of a study team that exposed human liver and fat cells grown in the lab to extracts of four natural chemicals found in Muscadine grapes, a dark-red variety native to the southeastern United States.

One of the chemicals, ellagic acid, proved particularly potent: It dramatically slowed the growth of existing fat cells and formation of new ones, and it boosted metabolism of fatty acids in liver cells.

These plant chemicals are not a weight-loss miracle, cautions Shay. "We didn't find, and we didn't expect to, that these compounds would improve body weight," he said. But by boosting the burning of fat, especially in the liver, they may improve liver function in overweight people.

"If we could develop a dietary strategy for reducing the harmful accumulation of fat in the liver, using common foods like grapes," Shay said, "that would be good news."

The study, which Shay conducted with colleagues at the University of Florida and University of Nebraska, complements work with mice he leads at his OSU laboratory. In one 2013 trial, he and his graduate students supplemented the diets of overweight mice with extracts from Pinot noir grapes harvested from Corvallis-area vineyards.