Ageing is an important determinant of atherosclerosis development rate, mainly by the creation of a chronic low-grade inflammation. Diet, and particularly its fat content, modulates the inflammatory response in the fasting and postprandial states. Our aim was to study the effects of dietary fat on the expression of genes related to inflammation (NF-kB, monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 (MCP-1), TNF-a and IL-6) and plaque stability (matrix metalloproteinase 9, MMP-9) during the postprandial state of twenty healthy, elderly people who followed three diets for 3 weeks each: (1) Mediterranean diet (Med Diet) enriched in MUFA with virgin olive oil; (2) SFA-rich diet; and (3) lowfat, high-carbohydrate diet enriched in n-3 PUFA (CHO-PUFA diet) by a randomised crossover design. At the end of each period, after a 12-h fast, the subjects received a breakfast with a composition similar to the one when the dietary period ended. In the fasting state, the Med Diet consumption induced a lower gene expression of the p65 subunit of NF-kB compared with the SFA-rich diet (P¼0·019). The ingestion of the Med Diet induced a lower gene postprandial expression of p65 (P¼ 0·033), MCP-1 (P¼0·0229) and MMP-9 (P¼0·041) compared with the SFA-rich diet, and a lower gene postprandial expression of p65 (P¼ 0·027) and TNF-a (P¼ 0·047) compared with the CHO-PUFA diet. Direct plasma quantification mostly reproduced the findings. Our data suggest that consumption of a Med Diet reduces the postprandial inflammatory response in mononuclear cells compared with the SFA-rich and CHO-PUFA diets in elderly people. These findings may be partly responsible for the lower CVD risk found in populations with a high adherence to the Med Diet.
Scope
Our aim was to investigate whether the inflammatory state associated to metabolic syndrome (MetS) patients is affected by diets with different fat quality and quantity.
Methods and results
Seventy‐five subjects from LIPGENE cohort were included in this feeding trial and randomly assigned to one of four diets: high saturated fatty acids (HSFA); high monounsaturated fatty acids (HMUFA) and two low‐fat, high complex carbohydrate (LFHCC) diets, supplemented with long‐chain n‐3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (LFHCC n‐3) or placebo (LFHCC), for 12 weeks each. A postprandial fat challenge, reflecting the intervention dietary fat composition, was conducted post‐intervention. The HMUFA diet significantly reduced postprandial nuclear transcription factor‐kappaB (NF‐kB) activity and the nuclear p65 protein levels relative to fasting values (p < 0.05). Furthermore, we observed a postprandial decrease in this protein with the HMUFA diet compared with the HSFA and LFHCC diets (p < 0.05). The postprandial response of inhibitory molecule from NF‐kB mRNA levels increased with the HMUFA diet compared with the HSFA and LFHCC n‐3 diets (p < 0.05). Postprandial tumor necrosis factor‐α and Metalloproteinase 9 mRNA levels were also reduced after the HMUFA diet compared with the HSFA diet (p < 0.05).
Conclusion
Our results indicate that the long‐term consumption of a healthy diet model with HMUFA attenuates the postprandial inflammatory state associated with MetS.
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