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Dear Colleagues and Friends,
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Components of the Mediterranean diet play an important role in the prevention of cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, obesity, neurodegenerative diseases, and cancer, among others. Regarding dietary habits, emotions are an important factor that can influence food consumption. Emotions are regulated by a variety of aspects, such as the intensity, duration, and type of emotion experienced. In an intervention study carried out in students from the Campus of Melilla (University of Granada) it was observed that adopting a dietary pattern, such as the Mediterranean diet, is linked to an improvement in emotional well-being. Furthermore, it was found that stricter adherence to the Mediterranean diet is linked to higher scores on the mental component of quality of life, suggesting a mental/emotional benefit from this dietary pattern. One of the hypotheses explaining the underlying mechanisms involves olive oil consumption, which is linked to a lower probability of cognitive deterioration in visual memory and an improvement in verbal fluency.
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Nutraceuticals are bioactive components present and transported by food, capable of favorably influencing health. The Mediterranean diet can be considered a nutritional package that is comprised of various nutraceuticals. Two key interactions have been described in association with the Mediterranean diet, which include a modulatory effect of the rapamycin pathway (mTOR) and on insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) levels, both of which are involved in the aging process and longevity. These effects have been attributed to the low animal protein content of this dietary pattern and its low glycemic index.
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The technological processes used to obtain EVOO allow for the preservation of various elements present within the olives. These compounds would otherwise be lost during the refining/rectification measures involved in the production of other vegetable oils (refined olive oils or sunflower oil, among others). The polyphenols of EVOO are responsible for its nutraceutical and protective properties against oxidative stress. A recent review suggests that these and other nutritional compounds have epigenetic targets in cancer cells which influence their formation, development and proliferation. In this line, studies have shown that it is possible to promote DNA reparation after prolonged exposure to UV rays from the sun through oleic acid, a compound found in EVOO. Furthermore, these antioxidant effects have been linked to reduced incidence of arteriosclerosis, diabetes, inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, skin diseases and aging, and tumor pathology.
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