Reducing negative effects of smoking and Counter the effects of air pollution with broccoli

Reducing negative effects of smoking and Counter the effects of air pollution with broccoli

Our body naturally has detoxifying enzymes,
not only in our liver but lining our airways.
Studies showing that people born with less effective detox enzymes
have an exaggerated allergic response to diesel exhaust,
suggesting that these enzymes actively combat the inflammation
caused by pollutants in the air.

A significant part of the population has these substandard forms of the enzyme.
What can we do to boost the activity of whichever detoxification
enzymes we have?
Broccoli can dramatically boost the activity of the detox enzymes in our liver, but what about our lungs?

Researchers fed some smokers a large stalk of broccoli every day for 10 days
to see if it would affect the level of inflammation within their bodies.
Why smokers?
Because smoking
is so inflammatory that you can end up with elevated C-reactive protein levels
for up to 30 years after quitting, and that inflammation can start almost
immediately after we start smoking, so it's very important to never begin with smoking.

But if you are a smoker, you can cut your level of that inflammation biomarker, CRP,
nearly in half, after just 10 days by eating a lot of broccoli.
It appears to cut inflammation in nonsmokers as well.

So what about air pollution?

We know the cruciferous compound is the most potent known inducer
of our detox enzymes.
This is why most of the research has
been about its ability to fight cancer, but here they tried to see if it could combat
the pro-inflammatory impact of pollutants such as diesel exhaust.

The group that had been getting a broccoli sprout extract,
the inflammation went down and stayed down.
Since the dose in these studies is equivalent to the consumption of 1 or 2 cups of broccoli,
their study demonstrates the potential preventive and therapeutic potential of broccoli.

If broccoli is so powerful at suppressing this inflammatory
immune response, might it interfere with normal immune function?
What you get is:
less inflammation, yet an
improved immune response.
So better immune function,
yet less inflammation,
potentially reducing the impact of pollution on allergic disease
and asthma—at least for an enthusiastic broccoli consumer.

But what about cancer?

detoxifying air pollutants throughout the rest of our body?
Off to China where they have some of the worst air pollution in the world.
By day one, those getting the broccoli sprouts
were able to get rid of 60% more benzene from their bodies,
a rapid, highly durable elevation in the detoxification of a known human carcinogen.
Now this was using broccoli sprouts, which are highly concentrated,
equivalent to about 5 cups of broccoli a day.
So we don't know how well more modest doses would perform.

Sources cited:
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