Post by robwhite on Jun 12, 2009 10:52:54 GMT -5
On one of the other forums i attend, an interesting topic was brought up today which was that of the role of hormesis in health. This laymans article gives a good overview of the concept: www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/sciencetoday/2008/0911/1221039054721.html
Basically, a small amount of the stress to the body provokes an adaptive immune response to the stress, which is necessary for health. Of course, this has been known in terms of lifestyle stress (such as Hans Selye's theories on General Adaptation, Eustress, etc.), and exercise stress, in the right amounts, that provoke positive adaptive mental, metabolic, and structural changes.
More recently, as suggested in the article above, its been found that many fruits and vegetables we eat also promote hormetic responses, because they produce low-level toxic chemicals as a defence mechanism to being eaten (they cant run away, so this is how they defend themselves) which mildly stress our digestive and immue systems, and promote hormetic, adaptive changes that keep us healthy. Kinda flies in the face of the concept that antioxidants are the sole health-promoting factor in fruit and veg, and in fact its been shown that high level antioxidant consumption can exceed a 'tipping point' and begin to promote free-radical damage (interestingly, some paleo entusiasts are now warning against high fruit and veg consumption because of the cumilative toxic load from it, and also because there is little evidence to suggest that our ancestors would have consumed large amounts of it (possibly because wild fruit and veg was much more bitter and had higher toxic loads than more domestic varieties))
This raises an important question - just how much of this 'hormetic stress' is needed to stay healthy. Do we exercise every single day, or just a few days a week? Should we steralize out environment and food as much as possible, or allow as much germ and chemical exposure as typically occurs in day-to-day living and food consumption? Which blocking factors used in MT are worth 'blocking'? Might blocking them all be detrimental to our health because we dont expose ourselves to hormetic stress?
Basically, a small amount of the stress to the body provokes an adaptive immune response to the stress, which is necessary for health. Of course, this has been known in terms of lifestyle stress (such as Hans Selye's theories on General Adaptation, Eustress, etc.), and exercise stress, in the right amounts, that provoke positive adaptive mental, metabolic, and structural changes.
More recently, as suggested in the article above, its been found that many fruits and vegetables we eat also promote hormetic responses, because they produce low-level toxic chemicals as a defence mechanism to being eaten (they cant run away, so this is how they defend themselves) which mildly stress our digestive and immue systems, and promote hormetic, adaptive changes that keep us healthy. Kinda flies in the face of the concept that antioxidants are the sole health-promoting factor in fruit and veg, and in fact its been shown that high level antioxidant consumption can exceed a 'tipping point' and begin to promote free-radical damage (interestingly, some paleo entusiasts are now warning against high fruit and veg consumption because of the cumilative toxic load from it, and also because there is little evidence to suggest that our ancestors would have consumed large amounts of it (possibly because wild fruit and veg was much more bitter and had higher toxic loads than more domestic varieties))
This raises an important question - just how much of this 'hormetic stress' is needed to stay healthy. Do we exercise every single day, or just a few days a week? Should we steralize out environment and food as much as possible, or allow as much germ and chemical exposure as typically occurs in day-to-day living and food consumption? Which blocking factors used in MT are worth 'blocking'? Might blocking them all be detrimental to our health because we dont expose ourselves to hormetic stress?