How food is prepared important to health: study
Last Updated: 2007-05-07 12:00:10 -0400 (Reuters Health)
By Anne Harding
研究表明烹饪方式对健康有重要影响

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - By relying more on steaming, boiling and stewing to cook foods and using acidic marinades on meat cooked with dry heat, people may be able to stay healthier, a New York City researcher suggests.
纽约市一位研究者建议，更多地采用蒸、煮和炖的方法来烹饪食物，以及用酸性物质浸泡一下准备用干热方法烹饪的肉类，对人体可能更健康。

These strategies will reduce the amount of advanced gycation end products (AGEs), or glycotoxins that people consume with their food says Dr. Helen Vlassara of Mt. Sinai School of Medicine. With her colleagues, Vlassara has found that the more AGEs healthy people eat, the greater their levels of inflammation and oxidative stress.
美国纽约大学西奈山医学院的Helen Vlassara博士说，这些方法将会减少人们所吃食物中晚期糖化终产物(AGEs)的含量。Vlassara和的她的同事们发现，健康的人摄入越多的晚期糖化终产物，体内出现炎症和氧化应激的程度就约严重。

"It is time that we pay more attention to these toxic substances ... because they are extremely abundant in our foods as we have developed them today," Vlassara told Reuters Health. "They do cause inflammation and they tend to accumulate in the body. Over a long time the constant low-grade inflammation can lead to organ damage and disease."
Vlassara对本报记者说：“我们现在应更关注这些有毒物质，因为他们大量存在于我们的食物当中。它们的确会引发炎症，而且在体内积聚。长时间的低程度炎症会损伤身体各器官并引发疾病。”

Vlassara points out that inflammation plays a key role in a host of increasingly common aging-related illnesses, including Alzheimer's disease, diabetes, and heart disease.
Vlassara指出，炎症是引发包括早老性痴呆、糖尿病和心脏病在内的大量与衰老有关的疾病的重要原因。

AGEs are produced by the interaction of sugars with proteins and certain fats, and are found in animal foods. Cooking foods for a longer time at a higher temperature, in the absence of water, significantly boosts their AGE content, as does processing them.
糖与蛋白质和某些脂肪的相互作用产生了晚期糖化终产物(AGEs)，它通常存在于动物性食品中。在缺水的情况下，以较高温度长时间烹饪食物会使晚期糖化终产物大大增加。

AGEs are also a byproduct of normal metabolism, but high levels are found in people with diabetes and heart disease, Vlassara and her team note in the Journal of Gerontology: Medical Sciences. As people age they may be less able to clear AGEs from their bodies, they add, while kidney disease also makes it more difficult for people to excrete glycotoxins.
Vlassara和她的研究队伍在美国《Journal of Gerontology》杂志上撰文指出，AGEs还是正常新陈代谢的副产品，糖尿病和心脏病人体内的这种物质的含量就比较高。随着人们衰老，清楚体内AGEs的能力就会下降。与此同时，肾脏病也会使人们更加难以将AGEs排出体外。

She and her colleagues had previously shown that diabetic individuals who ate a diet low in AGEs had lower levels of molecules involved in inflammation. The researchers have also found that aging mice have less oxidative stress and insulin resistance -- and live longer -- when they consume a low-AGE diet.
他们以前曾指出，摄入较少AGEs的糖尿病人体内所含有与炎症有关的分子数量较少。研究还发现，年老的老鼠如果摄入较少AGEs，它们的氧化应激和胰岛素抵抗就会减少，而且会活得更长。

To understand whether the amount of AGEs healthy people consume might be related to their level of inflammation, Vlassara and her colleagues looked at 172 healthy men and women. One group of study participants were younger than 45, while the others were over 60.
为了搞清楚健康人摄入的AGEs量是否与炎症程度有关，Vlassara及其同事对172名健康男女进行了研究。其中一组研究对象的年龄小于45岁，而另一组研究对象都在60岁以上。

The more AGEs people ate, the researchers found, the higher their blood levels of two types of AGEs in their blood. Consumption of AGEs also correlated directly with key indicators of inflammation and oxidative stress.
研究发现，人们摄入越多AGEs，他们血液中两种AGEs含量越高。AGEs摄入还和炎症及氧化应激的重要指标有直接关联。

People can reduce their AGE consumption, and possibly their risk of disease, by using high temperatures to cook foods less frequently, and cutting down on processed foods, Vlassara and her team note.
人们可以通过减少高温烹饪食物以及
加工食品的摄入量来控制AGEs的摄入。

Anyone concerned about AGE consumption should try to cook with water as often as possible, for example using boiling, steaming or stewing, rather than frying, Vlassara said in an interview. But people do not need to abstain from barbecue or grilling entirely; "moderation is the message, not eliminating something completely from the diet," she added. And marinating foods in lemon juice, vinegar or other acidic substances before cooking them with dry heat greatly reduces AGE formation, Vlassara noted.
那些关注AGEs摄入的人，应该尽可能经常加水来烹饪，比如用蒸、煮和炖而不是炒的方法。但是人们不必完全放弃烧烤。Vlassara说：“我们要适度，不必将某种食物彻底从饮食中除掉。”她还说，在用干热方法烹饪食物前用柠檬汁、醋或者其他酸性物质浸泡一下，会大大减少AGEs的产生。

Extrapolation from findings in both animals and humans suggests it's conceivable that people could extend their lives by reducing AGE consumption, she adds; to date, one of the only other interventions that has stretched lifespan in mammals is severe restriction of calorie intake.
对动物和人类进行的研究表明，人们可以通过减少AGEs的摄入来延长寿命。除此外，目前已知的可延长寿命的方法只有严格控制热量摄入。

"Our study shows that this can be done just by changing moderately the way we cook," Vlassara said. "In other words, we do not have to suffer any calorie restriction."
Vlassara说：“我们的研究表明，只要适当改变我们的烹饪方法就可以使我们活得更长，而不用承受控制摄入热量的痛苦。”

SOURCE: Journal of Gerontology: Medical Sciences, April 2007.