Health Benefits of Garlic

Health Benefits of Garlic
J-Queen's led team has discovered the reason why garlic is so good for us. There are many researchers believe that the organic compound, allicin in garlic that has been providing aroma and flavor, it also acts as an antioxidant is most powerful in the world. But until now has not been clear how allicin works, or how the composition of more frequent compared with antioxidants such as vitamin E and coenzyme Q10, which stop the damage caused by radical compounds.

"We can not understand how garlic contains antioxidant in an efficient, because it does not have a number of types of compounds usually responsible for high antioxidant activity in plants, such as the flavanoids found in green tea or grapes," Professor Derek Pratt, who led the study says Chemistry "If allicin was indeed responsible for this activity in garlic, we wanted to know how it works."

Health Benefits of Garlic

The research team tested the ability of allicin to trap damaging radicals so effectively, and considered the possibility that a decomposition product of allicin may instead be able to do so. Through experiments with synthetically-produced allicin, they found that the acid produced when the compound decomposes rapidly reacts with radicals.

Their findings are published in the January 2009 issue of the international chemistry journal Angewandte Chemie.

"Basically the allicin compound has to decompose in order to generate a potent antioxidant," explains Dr. Pratt, Canada Research Chair in Chemistry of free radicals. "The reaction between acid and radicals is as fast sulfenik he could, just limited to the time needed for the two molecules to come when in contact. No one has ever seen compounds, natural or synthetic, react this quickly as antioxidants. "

The researchers believe that there is a relationship between the reaction of acid sulfenik and benefits of garlic. "While garlic has been used as a herbal medicine for centuries and many garlic supplements on the market, until now there has been no convincing explanation as to why garlic is beneficial," says Dr. Pratt. "I think we have taken the first step in uncovering a fundamental chemical mechanism which may explain garlic's medicinal benefits."

Type with a red onion, garlic is a species in the family Alliaceae. All of these other plants contain a compound that is very similar to allicin, but they do not have the same medicinal properties. Dr. Pratt and his colleagues believe that this is due to a slower rate of decomposition of the allicin analogs in the onions, and garlic that leads to a lower level of sulfenic acid available to react as antioxidants with radicals.

The study was funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and Ontario Ministry of Innovation. Other members of the research team Chemistry post-doctoral researcher Vipraja Vaidya and Keith Ingold, from the National Research Council of Canada.

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