Nutrition Review

Worldwide, there are more than 1.5 billion overweight adults, including 400 million who are obese. In Australia, it is estimated more than 50 per cent of women and 60 per cent of men are either overweight or obese. Although restriction of diet often results in initial weight loss, more than 80 per cent of obese dieters fail to maintain their reduced weight.

Scientists including those from Queen's University have discovered that taking regular aspirin halves the risk of developing hereditary cancers. Hereditary cancers are those which develop as a result of a gene fault inherited from a parent. Bowel and womb cancers are the most common forms of hereditary cancers.

For decades the amyloid hypothesis has dominated the research field in Alzheimer's disease. The theory describes how an increase in secreted beta-amyloid peptides leads to the formation of plaques, toxic clusters of damaged proteins between cells, which eventually result in neurodegeneration.

Heart disease affects men and women in different ways. In women, symptoms of burgeoning heart disease are often more insidious, but when a heart attack strikes, it is more lethal than it is in men. Roughly 25 percent of men will die within a year of their first heart attack, but among women, 38 percent will die. Women are twice as likely as men to have a second heart attack within 6 years...

Researchers reporting online in the journal Cell, a Cell Press publication, on October 13th have found another good reason to eat your green vegetables, although it may or may not win any arguments with kids at the dinner table.

New research has shown for the first time that omega-3 in fish oil could "substantially and significantly" reduce the signs and symptoms of osteoarthritis. According to the University of Bristol study, funded by Arthritis Research UK and published in the journal Osteoarthritis and Cartilage, omega-3-rich diets fed to guinea pigs...

There is now another good reason to exercise. Besides burning calories, exercise restores the sensitivity of neurons involved in the control of satiety (feeling full), which in turn contributes to reduced food intake and consequently weight loss. This is the conclusion of a study led by Brazilian researchers at the University of Campinas...

Obesity is a growing problem worldwide, but proper protein consumption can help keep it at bay, according to a paper published Oct. 12 in the online journal PLoS ONE. Researchers found that, when subjects were fed a 10% protein diet, they consumed 12% more energy over four days than they did on a 15% protein diet. Moreover, 70%...

A long-held mantra suggests that you can't change your family, the genes they pass on, or the effect of these genes. Now, an international team of scientists, led by researchers at McMaster and McGill universities, is attacking that belief.

Men who took 400 international units (I.U.) of vitamin E daily had more prostate cancers compared to men who took a placebo, according to an updated review of data from the Selenium and Vitamin E Cancer Prevention Trial (SELECT). The findings showed that, per 1,000 men, there were 76 prostate cancers in men who took only vitamin E supplements, vs. 65 in men on placebo over a seven-year period, or 11 more cases of prostate cancer per 1,000 men.