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The US Department of Agriculture’s MyPyramid guidelines introduced a near doubling of the dietary recommendations for vegetables including dry beans—an important food staple in many traditional diets that can improve public health and nutrition. Populations with high legume (peas, beans, lentils) consumption have a low risk of cancer and chronic degenerative diseases. Common beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) are known as a rich, reliable source of non-digested compounds like fiber, phenolics, peptides and phytochemicals that are associated with health benefits. Emerging evidence indicates that common bean consumption is associated with reduced cancer risk in human populations, inhibiting carcinogenesis in animal models and inducing cell cycle arrest and apoptosis in cell cultures. Fiber may reduce the risk of premature death from all causes, whereas the whole non-digestible fraction from common beans exhibits anti-proliferative activity and induces apoptosis in vitro and in vivo colon cancer. The mechanisms responsible for this apparently protective role may include gene-nutrient interactions and modulation of proteins’ expression. This review investigates the potential health benefits and bioactivity of beans on tumor inhibition, highlighting studies involving functional compounds, mainly non-digestible fractions that modulate genes and proteins, thereby, unraveling their preventive role against the development of cancer.

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Trypsin inhibitors in grain legumes decrease the digestibility of protein and cause pancreatic enlargement. Seed samples of 17 field pea cultivars grown at 5 locations and 9 grass pea lines grown at 2 locations in western Canada during 1993 and 1994 were analyzed for trypsin inhibitor activity (TIA). TIAs in field pea differed significantly among cultivars. Mean TIA in field pea ranged from 2.22 trypsin inhibitor unit (TIU) mg-1 of dry matter (DM) for Danto to 7.66 TIU mg-1 of DM for Baroness. Cultivar accounted for more of the total variability (55%) in field pea than environment (18%). TIAs in grass pea did not differ among cultivars or environments. The mean TIA was 27.51 TIU mg-1 of DM for the grass pea lines tested. The correlation between the levels of TIA and seed yield was near zero in field pea and grass pea. Keywords: Field pea; grass pea; Lathyrus sativus L.; Pisum sativum L.; trypsin inhibitor activity