Therapeutic Food Supplements

THERAPEUTIC FOODS SUPPLEMENTS: SCIENCE, INTELLIGENCE, AND POWER

Our Therapeutic Food Supplements are founded upon the principle that as our environment becomes more toxic and life spins faster, our bodies require powerful and diverse high active nutrients. Plant-based foods that are formulated intelligently and farmed ecologically to deeply nourish and combat the growing multi-factorial assault on our bodies.

The field of nutritional supplementation is creative and exciting, but trustworthy only when it is combined with sound scientific findings. Innovation, along with concrete research and clinical experience is essential.

BioImmersion Inc. has formulated an innovative and exceptionally potent eco-farmed and wild crafted plant-based food supplements, along with foundational probiotic formulas that boast an advanced scientific research. Our patented, vital nutriceuticals offer a superb bioavailability of vitamins and minerals. This range is the culmination of 30 years of research and experience in the nutriceutical arena.

Research has shown that foods act as powerful, intelligent health-building agents in our bodies. Plant-based foods have rich scientific historicity; they enhance our health, protect us from harm, and boost our vitality. The Hormesis concept and mechanism is one of the most exciting scientific discoveries that explain the powerful mechanism of small amounts of phytonutrients in our body.

HERMETIC MECHANISM OF PHYTONUTRIENTS

Scientists have discovered that small amounts of foods offer important nutrients as well as information that stimulate positive changes in our body. This is the concept of Hormesis, an adaptive response mechanism of cells and organism to a moderate stress. Hormesis at the cellular and molecular level is considered a new approach for the prevention and treatment of different diseases (Mattson, 2008).

In the fields of toxicology, biology and medicine, hormesis is defined as an adaptive response of cells and organism to low dosages of phytochemicals. Stressors of different kinds in our environment and foods, even certain toxins in minute amounts, can elicit protective responses (Calabrese & Baldwin, 1999, 2005). Mattson (2008a) explains how small amounts of phytochemicals (plant nutrients) induce a protective response: broccoli induces the expression of cytoprotective phase 2 proteins in liver, intestinal and stomach cells (see McWalter et al., 2004). Resveratrol creates a phytochemical hermetic mechanism of action that is protective against myocardial infarction and stroke (Baur & Sinclair, 2006).

Some studies claim that it is not the antioxidant activity in itself that confers health benefits (e.g., Williams & Fisher, 2005) but certain hermetic mechanism found in phytochemicals. Examples include sulforaphane in broccoli (Dinkova-Kostova et al., 2002), allicin found in garlic (Chen et al., 2004), and curcumin in turmeric (Balogum et al., 2003). In fact, scientists now find that high amounts of antioxidants, such as vitamin E, are not as effective as smaller dosages (Riccioni et al., 2007; Kline et al., 2007). Antioxidant properties in plants are now thought to activate stress resistance pathways to induce the expression of endogenous antioxidant enzymes (Calaberese et al., 2010).

Mattson and Cheng (2006) explain that many of the beneficial chemicals in vegetables and fruits evolved as toxins to possibly dissuade insects and other predators. For example, at sub-toxic dosages, phytochemicals such as resveratrol, sulforaphanes, or curcumin stimulate ‘neurohormesis’ pathways to “protect neurons against injury or disease by stimulating the production of antioxidant enzymes, neurotrophic factors, protein chaperones and other proteins that help cells to withstand stress.” Murugaiyah and Mattson (2015) conclude that a diet rich in phytochemicals offers many health benefits for the body and brain. Scientists such as Lee at al., 2014; Slavin & Lloyd, 2012; Carter et al., 2010), concur. Hormesis as a mechanism is responsible for protection and repair for plants and humans.

Food as medicine is an ancient concept - but food backed by science and conscientiously grown and manufactured - has the power to transform lives.

REFERENCES

Balogun, E., Hoque, M., Gong, P., Killeen, E., Green, C.J., Foresti, R… Motterlini, R. (2003). Curcumin activates the haem oxygenase-1 gene via regulation of Nrf2 and the antioxidant-responsive element. Biochem J, 371, 887–895.

Baur, J.A., & Sinclair, D.A. (2006). Therapeutic potential of resveratrol: the in vivo evidence. Nat Rev Drug Discov, 5, 493–506.

Calabrese, V., Cornelius, C., Dinkova-Kostova, A.T., Calabrese, E.J., Mattson, M.P. (2010). Cellular stress responses, the hormesis paradigm, and vitagenes: novel targets for therapeutic intervention in neurodegenerative disorders. Antioxid Redox Signal, 13(11), 1763-811.

Calabrese, E.J, & Blain, R. (2005). The occurrence of hormetic dose responses in the toxicological literature, the hormesis database: an overview. Toxicol Appl Pharmacol, 202, 289–301.

Calabrese, E.J., & Baldwin, L.A. (1999). Chemical hormesis: its historical foundations as a biological hypothesis. Toxicol Pathol, 27, 195–216

Carter, P., Gray, L.J., Troughton, J., Khunti, K., Davies, M.J. (2010). Fruit and vegetable intake and incidence of type 2 diabetes mellitus: systematic review and meta-analysis. BMJ, 341, c4229.

Chen, C., Pung, D., Leong, V., Hebbar, V., Shen, G., Nair, S., Li, W., Kong, A.N. (2004). Induction of detoxifying enzymes by garlic organosulfur compounds through transcription factor Nrf2: effect of chemical structure and stress signals. Free Radic Biol Med, 37, 1578–1590.

Dinkova-Kostova, A.T., Holtzclaw, W.D., Cole, R.N., Itoh, K., Wakabayashi, N., Katoh, Y., Yamamoto, M., Talalay, P. (2002). Direct evidence that sulfhydryl groups of Keap1 are the sensors regulating induction of phase 2 enzymes that protect against carcinogens and oxidants. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 99, 11908–11913.

Lee, J., Jo, D.G., Park, D., Chung, H.Y., Mattson, M.P. (2014). Adaptive cellular stress pathways as therapeutic targets of dietary phytochemicals: focus on the nervous system. Pharmacol Rev, 66(3), 815-68.

McWalter, G.K., Higgins, L.G., McLellan, L.I., Henderson, C.J., Song, L., Thornalley, P.J… Hayes, J.D. (2004). Transcription factor Nrf2 is essential for induction of NAD(P)H:quinone oxidoreductase 1, glutathione S-transferases, and glutamate cysteine ligase by broccoli seeds and isothiocyanates. J Nutr, 134, 3499S–3506S.

Mattson, M.P. (2008). Hormesis defined. Ageing Res Rev, 7(1), 1-7. doi:  10.1016/j.arr.2007.08.007

Mattson M.P. (2008a). Diet-induced hormesis and longevity. Ageing Res Rev, 7(1), 43-48. doi:  10.1016/j.arr.2007.08.004

Mattson, M.P., & Cheng, A. (2006). Neurohormetic phytochemicals: Low-dose toxins that induce adaptive neuronal stress responses. Trends Neurosci, 29(11), 632-9.

Murugaiyah, V., & Mattson, M.P. (2015). Neurohormetic phytochemicals: An evolutionary-bioenergetic perspective. Neurochem Int, 89, 271-80.

Riccioni, G., Bucciarelli, T., Mancini, B., Di Ilio, C., Capra, V., D'Orazio, N. (2007). The role of the antioxidant vitamin supplementation in the prevention of cardiovascular diseases. Expert Opin Investig Drugs, 16(1), 25-32.

Slavin JL, Lloyd B. (2012). Health benefits of fruits and vegetables. Adv Nutr, 3(4), 506-16.

Williams, K.J., Fisher, E.A. (2005). Oxidation, lipoproteins, and atherosclerosis: which is wrong, the antioxidants or the theory? Curr Opin Clin Nutr Metab Care, 8, 139–146.