First lycopene (a substance and tomatoes) was thought to reduce prostate cancer risk. Then new studies cast doubt on the benefits of lycopene. Part of the confusion may stem from how the tomatoes are prepared. The various methods used to cook foods can either decrease or increase the food’s health properties. Dehydration may be the healthiest way to prepare tomatoes; when tomatoes are dehydrated into a powder and then made into a pace, a substance called FruHis (a carbohydrate) is produced.
Rats, Prostate Cancer, and Tomatoes
Researchers, who published their findings in the June 2008 issue of the journal Cancer Research, took rats and fed them either a normal diet or diet with tomato powder and FruHis. Next, they gave all the rats chemicals that cause prostate cancer. The group on the normal diet died after 40 weeks (on average). The group with a diet of dehydrated tomatoes and FruHis lived for 51 weeks (on average).This research adds to FruHis to the list of substances worthy of exploration so that we can better understand the health benefits of tomatoes. It also shows how difficult nutritional research is. Foods have thousands of substances, and there are dozens of ways to prepare them. We've only scratched the surface of the help and successful aging benefits of foods.
Source: Valeri V. Mossine, Pankaj Chopra and Thomas P. Mawhinney Interaction of Tomato Lycopene and Ketosamine against Rat Prostate Tumorigenesis. Cancer Research 68, 4384-4391, June 1, 2008.
