Abstract:
The reason why tomatoes have long been regarded as a healthy food is largely due to the antioxidant star that gives them their bright red color - lycopene. However, a new scientific study from Tufts University in the United States has overturned this traditional belief: a colorless substance in tomatoes that is invisible to the naked eye may play an unexpected and key role in protecting liver health.
This study published in the academic journal "Molecular Nutrition & Food Science" pointed out that tomatoes are rich in a colorless carotenoid called phytoene. In the process of synthesizing lycopene in plants, phytoene plays a bridging role as a precursor substance, but it itself lacks color, so it has long been overshadowed by the light of red lycopene in nutrition and public perception.
A research team led by Xiang-Dong Wang, a senior scientist at the Jean Maier USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging (HNRCA) at Tufts University, found that when mice fed a high-refined carbohydrate diet were supplemented with phytoene, the development and progression of fatty liver lesions were significantly inhibited. Compared with the control group, mice that consumed this ingredient significantly reduced fat accumulation in the liver, and related metabolic indicators and liver function damage markers also showed significant improvements.
The researchers further explored and found that the health protection brought by phytoene may not be entirely directly mediated by itself, but is closely related to its metabolites in the body. This compound can be decomposed and transformed under the digestive and metabolic mechanisms, thereby regulating the liver fat metabolism pathway and inhibiting inflammatory responses. In view of the differences in nutrient absorption and metabolic conversion abilities of different individuals, the research team pointed out that this may explain why the liver-protective effect of tomato-based diets varies among different groups of people.
With changes in modern dietary structure, metabolic dysfunction-associated fatty liver disease (MASLD) has become an important challenge to global public health. Professor Wang Xiangdong said that this discovery opens up new paths for dietary intervention and functional food development in non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. If its efficacy is further confirmed in clinical human trials in the future, phytoene or whole-tomato deep-processed nutritional supplements containing this precursor are expected to be used as supplementary dietary strategies to help the public more effectively maintain liver metabolic health.
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