Researchers have shown that strawberry consumption boosts antioxidant capacity of the blood by improving the response of red blood cells to oxidative stress. Blood samples were taken from 12 healthy individuals who ate 500 grams of fresh strawberries each day, after 4, 8, 12, 16, and 30 days later. The results revealed that the blood’s antioxidant capacity and also the red blood cells’ resistance to oxidative haemolysis can be improved with regular consumption of strawberries.
Some varieties of strawberries manufacture erythrocytes which are more resistant to oxidative stress. Each variety has antioxidants in varying quantities and proportions; the ‘Sveva’ variety was used in this study.
The body has a huge arsenal of diversified antioxidant mechanisms functioning at different levels. These mechanisms can be cellular tools which repair genetic material that’s been oxidised, or molecules which are either consumed through the diet or manufactured by the body itself that neutralize free radicals. There are a large amount of phenolic compounds in strawberries, which include flavonoids that have antioxidant properties.
These compounds reduce oxidative stress, which is an imbalance linked to various diseases, such as diabetes, cancer, and cardiovascular disease, and also physiological situations such as physical exercise, ageing and birth, as well as in the fight between the antioxidant defenses of the body and “reactive kinds of oxygen”, particularly free radicals.
When these antioxidant defenses are exceeded by oxidation levels, oxidative stress takes place. Besides leading to certain illnesses, oxidative stress is also involved in phenomena like the rate at which we age.
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