Eating greens can change effect of genes

[img_inline align=”right” src=”http://padnws01.mcmaster.ca/images/vegetables.jpg” caption=”Scientists led by researchers at McMaster and McGill universities have found that the generous consumption of fruit and raw vegetables can modify the gene that is the strongest marker for heart disease. The results of the study support the public health recommendation to consume more than five servings of fruits or vegetables as a way to promote good health. Photo via flickr.com/photos/suckamc.”]An international team of scientists, led by researchers at McMaster and McGill
universities, has found that you may be able to change the effect of the genes you're
given by your parents.

The researchers discovered the gene that is the strongest marker for heart disease,
called 9p21, can actually be modified through the consumption of generous amounts of
fruit and raw vegetables.

“We observed that the effect of a high-risk genotype can be mitigated by consuming a
diet high in fruits and vegetables,” said Sonia Anand, joint principal investigator of the
study and a researcher at the Population Health Research Institute and a professor of
medicine and epidemiology at the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine at McMaster
University. “Our results support the public health recommendation to consume more
than five servings of fruits or vegetables as a way to promote good health.”

The research, which represents one of the largest gene-diet interaction studies ever
conducted on cardiovascular disease, involved the analysis of more than 27,000
individuals from five ethnicities – European, South Asian, Chinese, Latin American and
Arab – and the affect that their diets had on the effect of the 9p21 gene. The results
suggest that individuals with the high-risk genotype who consumed a prudent diet,
composed mainly of raw vegetables, fruits and berries, had a similar risk of heart attack
to those with the low-risk genotype.

“We know that 9p21 genetic variants increase the risk of heart disease for those that
carry it,” said Jamie Engert, joint principal investigator of the study and researcher in
cardiovascular diseases at the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre
(RI-MUHC) and associate member in the Department of Human Genetics at McGill
University. “But it was a surprise to find that a healthy diet could significantly weaken its
effect.”

“Our research suggests there may be an important interplay between genes and diet in
cardiovascular disease,” said the study's lead author Ron Do, who conducted this
research as part of his PhD at McGill and is now based at the Center for Human Genetics
Research at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. “Future research is necessary
to understand the mechanism of this interaction, which will shed light on the underlying
metabolic processes that the 9p21 gene is involved in.”

The results of the study are published in the current issue of the journal PLoS Medicine.