3ac Health Tips

 

Glyconutrients may strengthen your immune system

Would you believe that sugar might help your body fight viruses, bacteria or even heart disease? Although refined sugar intake causes all sorts of problems, not the least of which is impairment to the immune system, natural sugar compounds - called glyconutrients - are something else entirely. Eight essential sugar compounds function individually as building blocks to assemble a nearly infinite variety of complex molecules known as glycans or sugar chains.
 
Glyconutrients can prevent viruses and bacteria from adhering to cells by taking up all their receptor sites. If the viruses or bacteria can't bind to a cell, they can't make you sick; it's as simple as that. Turns out other sugar chains can work in similar ways to bind up all sorts of viruses and bacteria in other parts of the body.
 
And there's another more complex role that these sugar chains play in the body. Glycans form a sugar coat around every single cell in the body, as well as filling up the spaces in between cells. They act as a sort of information conduit for the body, regulating communication both within the cell and between that cell and other cells.
 
Sugar chains play a vital role in nearly every physiological process, including immune system response, tissue regeneration and cell replication. One of the most important functions of glycans is the facilitation of brain functions. For instance, serotonin and other neurotransmitters require glycan receptors in order to bind to the surface of nerve cells. Memory, stress response and other critical brain functions may become debilitated without the adequate assistance of glyconutrient sugar chains.
 
Food processing removes beneficial glyconutrients
 
If you eat a diet rich in unprocessed fruits and vegetables you'll supply your body with many glyconutrients. But just because they're sugars doesn't mean they taste sweet. For instance: Fucose, xylose and mannose are three of the eight essential sugar compounds. Mushrooms and seeds contain fucose; rye, barley and yeast contain xylose; and mannose can be found in broccoli, cabbage and seeds.
 
Problems arise when any of the foods mentioned above are highly processed. For instance, grapes and onions deliver glucose, one of the eight glyconutrients. But when glucose is processed into table sugar, nutrients and fibre are completely stripped away, transforming it from good nutrition into something that can compromise your health. So the absence of unprocessed glyconutrients in the average diet is a concern.
 
Glyconutrients have the potential to combat serious conditions Of the eight basic glyconutrients, most diets only deliver sufficient amounts of two: glucose and galactose (a milk sugar). Trace amounts of the other six are picked up here and there, but modern agricultural methods, food processing and chemical contamination have all but erased them from our food supply.
 
In recent years, research has shown that supplementary glyconutrients may improve cellular communication, with a positive impact on a wide range of conditions; from skin ageing and bacterial infection to debilitating illnesses like muscular dystrophy, atherosclerosis, Alzheimer's disease, and Parkinson's disease.