Want to live longer? Have more Omega-3 in your diet

[General Zod]

Sauce.

At the end of a residential cul-de-sac in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, a driveway winds up a hill to the headquarters of Ocean Nutrition, a complex of buildings of mid-century vintage overlooking the tall-masted schooners and gray-hulled Canadian Navy destroyers in Halifax Harbour.

Down the road, semi-trailers loaded with drums of oily yellow liquid pull up outside a newly built factory. Inside cavernous galvanized-steel hangars, the oil is blended with deionized water in 6,500-gallon tanks. The resulting slurry of micro-encapsulated oil is then pumped through a five-story spray-drier to remove the moisture.

The final product is a fine-grained beige substance that looks like flour but is, in fact, a triumph of technology: smelly fish oil, transformed by industry into a tasteless, odorless powder. It will be used to spike everything from infant formula in China to the Wonder Bread and Tropicana orange juice on our supermarket shelves.

Ocean Nutrition is not manufacturing some Soylent Green for the new millennium.

After seven years and $50 million of research, the company's 45 technicians and 14 Ph.D.s have found a high-tech way of getting a crucial set of nutrients back into our bodies — compounds that, thanks to the industrialization of agriculture over the past half century, have been thoroughly stripped from our food supply without, until recently, it being realized by anyone.

Now, an ever-growing body of research is showing that the epidemic of diseases associated with the Western diet — cancer, heart disease, depression, and much more — might be curtailed simply by restoring something we never should have removed from our diets in the first place: omega-3 fatty acids.

The great mistake
We are, it is often — and accurately — said, what we eat. Recent diet trends, from Atkins to South Beach, have put the emphasis on upping our intake of protein or cutting out carbohydrates. Meanwhile, cholesterol, saturated fats, and trans fats have been stigmatized, leading to the belief that waging a total war on fat is the best way to get a slimmer waistline and a longer life. But fats are as crucial to a healthy body as protein is; they end up holstered into the heart, protecting organs, and building the cells of the brain, an organ that is itself 60 percent fat. The key to good health lies not in ruthlessly striking fat from our diets, but in eating the best possible fats for our bodies. And a growing chorus of nutritionists agrees that those fats are omega-3s.

Certainly, you've read headlines trumpeting the ability of omega-3 fatty acids to boost brain function and protect against coronary heart disease. Hedging your bets, you may already have tweaked your diet, substituting beef or poultry for salmon or some other oily fish a few times a week. But, as a jaded observer of food trends, you may have wondered whether the new "heart-healthy" fats touted on the packaging of eggs, margarine, spaghetti, and frozen waffles are just a marketing ploy — the latest in a long line of miracle nutrients that, a few months or years hence, will prove to be nothing more than hype.

Lose the skepticism. This isn't the next oat bran.

Omega-3 molecules are a by-product of the happy meeting of sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide in the chloroplasts of terrestrial plants and marine algae. Not long ago, these fatty acids were an inescapable component of our diet. Back in the early 1900s — long before the arrival of bovine growth hormone and patented transgenic seeds — American family farms were perfect factories for producing omega-3s.

Bucolic, sun-drenched pastures supported a complex array of grasses, and cattle used their sensitive tongues to pick and choose the ripest patches of clover, millet, and sweet grass; their rumens then turned the cellulose that humans can't digest into foods that we can: milk, butter, cheese, and, eventually, beef, all of them rich in omega-3s. Cattle used to spend four to five carefree years grazing on grass, but now they are fattened on grain in feedlots and reach slaughter weight in about a year, all the while pumped full of antibiotics to fight off the diseases caused by the close quarters of factory farms.

Likewise, a few generations ago, chickens roamed those same farms, foraging on grasses, purslane, and grubs, providing humans with drumsticks, breasts, and eggs that were rich in grass-derived omega-3s. Today, most American chickens are now a single hybrid breed — the Cornish — and are raised in cages, treated with antibiotics, and stuffed full of corn.

Our animal fats were once derived from leafy greens, and now our livestock are fattened with corn, soybeans, and other seed oils. (Even the majority of the salmon, catfish, and shrimp in our supermarkets are raised on farms and fattened with soy-enriched pellets.) So not only have good fats been stricken from our diets, but these cheap, widely available seed oils are the source of another, far less healthy family of fatty acids called omega-6s, which compete with omega-3s for space in our cell membranes. Omega-6s are essentially more rigid fatty acids that give our cells structure, while omega-3s are more fluid and help our bodies fight inflammation. Our ancestors ate a ratio of dietary omega-6s to omega-3s of approximately 1:1. The Western diet (the modern American and European eating pattern characterized by high intakes of red meat, sugar, and refined carbohydrates) has a ratio of about 20:1.

"The shift from a food chain with green plants at its base to one based on seeds may be the most far reaching of all," writes Michael Pollan in his prescriptive manifesto In Defense of Food. "From leaves to seeds: It's almost, if not quite, A Theory of Everything."

This shift began in earnest in the 1960s. Research on the links between cholesterol and saturated fats and coronary heart disease led health authorities to demonize lard, dairy products, and other animal-derived sources of fat. Meanwhile, new health guidelines lionized the polyunsaturated fats in vegetable oils and margarine (which is merely vegetable oil solidified via hydrogenation, a process that creates the dreaded trans fats).

Food processors were happy to play along: Polyunsaturated seed oils did not go rancid as quickly as omega-3s, which meant a longer shelf life for packaged foods. One form of fat in particular, omega-6-rich soybean oil, is now ubiquitous in processed foods. Soybeans, originally an import from East Asia, have become the second most valuable food crop in the United States. Genetically modified to resist pests, they are crushed to make high-protein meal for livestock, and the heavily subsidized industry has found ingenious ways of moving its product in the form of "soy isoflavones," "textured vegetable protein," "soy protein isolate," and the other novel ingredients lurking on the labels of processed foods.

Look around your kitchen and you'll find soybean oil in everything from salad dressing to Crisco, from processed cheese to granola bars. If you are eating a processed food, chances are it contains soy. Twenty percent of Americans' calories now come from soybeans; the average person eats 25 pounds of the stuff a year. Just four seed oils — soybean, corn, cottonseed, and canola oil — account for 96 percent of the vegetable oil eaten in America today.

The spread of the seed-oil-rich Western diet around the world has been tracked by a statistical rise in the so-called diseases of civilization: asthma and arthritis, depression and Alzheimer's, heart disease and cancer, as well as metabolic disorders such as diabetes and obesity.

Living longer on a 'poor man's diet'
Okinawans, of Japan, once had the longest life expectancy in the world. But with postwar American administration, which didn't end until 1972, residents of the Japanese prefecture switched to a Western diet rich in meat and seed-based vegetable oils (think Spam, McDonald's hamburgers, and margarine). As a result, they experienced a precipitous rise in cancer, diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases. Western eating habits proved hard to shake, and 47 percent of Okinawan men are still considered obese, twice the rate of the rest of Japan.

According to a 2003 study published in the World Review of Nutrition and Dietetics, urban Indians who have adopted seed-oil-rich diets succumb to heart disease and chronic illnesses at a much higher rate than village dwellers who eat a "poor man's diet" that is high in mustard oil, which is relatively high in omega-3s. It is believed that, in the 1960s, Israelis enthusiastically adopted an ostensibly heart-healthy diet rich in polyunsaturated fats from vegetable oils; now heart disease, high blood pressure, and diabetes are ubiquitous, and rates of cancer are higher than in the United States.

In 1970, intrigued by reports that Eskimos rarely die from heart disease, two Danish scientists flew to Greenland and charmed blood samples from 130 volunteers. Hans Olaf Bang and Jørn Dyerberg discovered that the Inuit people still got most of their calories from fish, seal, and whale meat. Despite their high cholesterol intake, the Inuit had a death rate from coronary disease that was one-tenth that of the Danes, enthusiastic pork eaters who have been known to butter even their cheese. And diabetes was almost non-existent among the Inuit.

Bang and Dyerberg found strikingly high levels of omega-3s and relatively low amounts of omega-6s in the Inuit blood samples. In 1978, they published a groundbreaking paper in The Lancet, establishing the link between omega-3 consumption and lower rates of coronary heart disease. It initiated a paradigm shift among nutritionists, one that is only now truly influencing official dietary policy around the world.

"There has been a thousandfold increase in the consumption of soybean oil over the past hundred years," says Joseph Hibbeln, MD, acting chief of the section on nutritional neurosciences at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. The result, he states, is an unplanned experiment in brain and heart chemistry, one whose subject is the entire population of the developed world. In a series of epidemiological studies, Dr. Hibbeln showed that populations that consume high levels of omega-3s in the form of seafood are the least afflicted by the major diseases associated with the Western diet.

Among the Japanese, who each eat an average of 145 pounds of fish a year, rates of depression and homicide are strikingly low. Meanwhile, men who live in landlocked nations such as Austria and Hungary, where fish consumption is respectively 25 pounds and nine pounds per capita, top the global charts in suicide and depression. Despite the fact that the Japanese smoke like fiends, struggle with high blood pressure, and eat a hundred more cholesterol-rich eggs a year per person than Americans do, they boast enviably low rates of cardiovascular disease, as well as the longest life span on the planet, an average of 81 years... three years longer than that of Americans.

And while it's true that the Japanese consume soy in the form of tofu, miso, and soy sauce, the way it is prepared — precipitated or fermented — is far healthier than the raw, mineral-blocking phytate estrogen and omega-6-rich versions consumed by Americans.

Dr. Hibbeln is convinced that the key to the average Japanese citizen's longevity is omega-3 fatty acids; levels in Japanese bloodstreams average 60 percent of all polyunsaturates. After half a century of favoring seed-based vegetable oils, the level of omega-3s in American bloodstreams has fallen to 20 percent of polyunsaturates. "We have changed the composition of people's bodies and brains," says Dr. Hibbeln. "A very interesting question, to which we don't yet know the answer, is to what degree has the dietary change altered overall behavior in our society?"

Lately, the answers have been coming in thick and fast. In one study of 231 inmates medicated with fish oil in a British prison, assaults dropped by a third. Comparing homicide rates in five countries, Dr. Hibbeln found that the rising consumption of omega-6 fatty acids correlated with a hundredfold increase in death by homicide, even though access to firearms went down in all the countries surveyed except the United States. A paper published in the Journal of the American Medical Association concluded that even a modest increase in the consumption of omega-3-rich fish reduced the risk of coronary death by 36 percent. A 2007 study by the National Institutes of Health found a positive correlation between mothers' consumption of omega-3s during pregnancy and the fine motor skills and verbal IQs of their children.

Increasing the amount of omega-3s in your diet might even reverse obesity: Omega-6s are, in the words of one researcher, "remarkable boosters of adipogenesis," which is to say the formation of fatty tissues. Animals that are fed diets high in omega-6s gain far more weight from the same amount of calories than their grass-fed counterparts, and that hard-to-lose fat in the middle-aged paunch, it turns out, is mostly omega-6s. A higher intake of omega-3 has been shown to positively affect ailments as diverse as stroke, allergies, dementia, and dyslexia.

"Men in their forties and fifties can nearly reverse their risk of dying from sudden cardiac death by eating fish at least three times a week," says Dr. Hibbeln. "And if they want to live longer and happier lives, there's substantial data that they should increase their body composition of omega-3s." Your family doctor can test your ratio of omega-6 to omega-3, or you can do it yourself. (Your Future Health sells test kits on its Web site, yourfuturehealth.com.)

How could a simple change in dietary fat have such a huge impact on so many aspects of our health? The answer lies in the nature of two specific forms of omega-3s, docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), which are especially rich in seafood.

Not all omega-3 fatty acids, it turns out, are created equal.

It's a long read, and there's more in the link. But I found it far too interesting not to pass on, especially given there's a number of people here trying to lose weight. (This might be more appropriate for OT, I'm not sure). At any rate it's nice to know exactly what the cause is behind making Americans so fucking fat. It'd be interesting to see what kind of effort it would take to swing the balance back to producing more foods with omega-3 fatty acids rather than omega-6 and what kind of effect it would have on our fatass population.

[Chardok]

I started taking omega 3 supplements after I found out about my cholesterol and can vouch for the mental acuity add-on, as well as energy level increases. I also supplement Co Q-10 because my Statin blocks absorbtion of it. It's good to make sure you also take a good multivitamin with your fish oil supp, though; the zinc, etc. will augment it's uptake. I don't know too much about the bitching on Soy protein though - I eat soybeans all the time (Roasted and raw) and They're supposed to be compeltely awesome for you. Maybe it's the processing which makes the oil into the bad omega-6's they're talking about in the article. PLEASE don't take my soybeans/milk away from me!!!

[General Zod]

I started taking omega 3 supplements after I found out about my cholesterol and can vouch for the mental acuity add-on, as well as energy level increases. I also supplement Co Q-10 because my Statin blocks absorbtion of it. It's good to make sure you also take a good multivitamin with your fish oil supp, though; the zinc, etc. will augment it's uptake. I don't know too much about the bitching on Soy protein though - I eat soybeans all the time (Roasted and raw) and They're supposed to be compeltely awesome for you. Maybe it's the processing which makes the oil into the bad omega-6's they're talking about in the article. PLEASE don't take my soybeans/milk away from me!!!

From what I'm getting on the gist of the article it's not that soybeans are bad per se, it's that Americans wind up eating a grossly unbalanced amount compared to foods with omega-3 acids. Keeping the ratio 1:1 or similar should be fine.

[Kanastrous]

I wonder if there may be reason to suspect a linkage between the 'American diet' and the apparent rise in autism-spectrum disorders.

re: soybeans it's also apparently important how the soybeans are processed - American practice is different than Japanese.

[Forum Troll]

Melatonin supplements caused a 20% increase in lifespan of lab rats (subject to the right dosage applied at the right time, else even a decrease if a harmful overdose in youth).

Kinetin prolonged the average lifespan of fruit flies by 65%, while also working in tests on cultured human skin cells.

Nobody has done the needed multi-decade studies to determine the effects on humans yet. As said in the last post in the fear of death thread, you should exercise caution before dosing yourself with a bunch of pills of each ordered online, especially since the dosage and interactions could be complex, generally recommended to be done only under the supervision of a physician.

However, such plus resveratrol, omega-3, and other supplements have really interesting potential. Some of these only became available as commercial supplements in the past few years, though some have been received in moderate amounts by some eating the right diets (like fish for omega-3), perhaps among the many factors partially influencing why some people live to 100 and others only to 70.

[Broomstick]

Since the ultimate origin of omega-3's seems to be plants, I would expect that cutting back (or cutting out) processed foods and eating a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables would also be beneficial.... which has been backed up by various studies.

So... less processed food, more plant-based food, more fish, less red meat/fowl.... Haven't we heard this before?

Drill down deeper you get into choosing eggs produced in such a manner as to result in higher omega-3's, eating wild fish (responsibly harvested, one hopes) and other complications, but the basic concept in the prior paragraph would certainly steer a person in the right direction with little effort.

[General Zod]

Nobody has done the needed multi-decade studies to determine the effects on humans yet. As said in the last post in the fear of death thread, you should exercise caution before dosing yourself with a bunch of pills of each ordered online, especially since the dosage and interactions could be complex, generally recommended to be done only under the supervision of a physician.

I don't think anyone's saying we should change our diets overnight and start scarfing down the omega-3 acids as much as possible, but a gradual transition certainly couldn't hurt.

[Forum Troll]

I don't think anyone's saying we should change our diets overnight and start scarfing down the omega-3 acids as much as possible, but a gradual transition certainly couldn't hurt.

I wasn't talking about omega-3 there. Reasonable omega-3 intake is apparently beneficial at any age, indeed naturally common among populations eating a lot of fish.

In contrast, melatonin is a rather different compound. Melatonin supplementation appears to best be done only in the right age bracket. Kinetin and melatonin taken in the right amounts might make one typically live longer than any people do naturally, judging from the animal studies, but of course taking a lot of pills of them is unusual enough as to require caution.

[kinnison]

Hmmm... I do know a bit about this subject - I ought to, as I've been running a natural foods/supplements shop for 20+ years now and have made a point of learning as much as I can (though formal training is largely absent).

A couple of cautions that might be worth mentioning: Omega 3 oils are just about the most heavily polyunsaturated that you are likely to consume, especially the EPA and DHA (short for a couple of really long words) in fish oils - the alpha linolenic acid in flaxseed/linseed oil not so much. This matters because polyunsaturates are extremely susceptible to oxidation and other forms of free radical damage; so if you decide to increase omega 3 intake, make sure that your intake of fat-soluble antioxidants such as vitamin E is also increased. Indidentally, most supplemental omega 3 has vitamin E added and I suspect that oily fish contains it naturally. Failing to do this might actually make the omega 3 oils harmful.

Second: EPA and DHA, particularly EPA, have fairly strong anticoagulant effects; so if you are taking such drugs (the three most common are aspirin, clopidogrel - Plavix - and warfarin (Coumadin in the USA?) in increasing order of strength) be very careful about starting to increase omega 3 intake. In fact, in such a case consult a professional first for safety. In the extreme limit, there is a possibility of unusual bleeding, haematoma and very occasionaly haemorrhagic stroke, so don't mess with it! Actually, a good rule of thumb with warfarin is to consult a professional first before doing anything at all, including changes of diet - it interacts with just about everything.

Omega 3 oils, for the above reason, should also never be used for cooking. Used that way they may be merely useless but will more likely be harmful.

I hope this info, if not duplicated, is of use.

[Broomstick]

Yes, warfarin=coumadin.

[Chardok]

Excellent info, Thanks very much, Kinnison - since I've started trying to eat right (And succeeding, I might add) I've started supplementing omega 3 capsules, but I've also started taking a multi with 100% of my daily Vitamin E in it - so I think I should be good (PS I'm fishing for affirmation). Also - be careful if you increase your fish intake to get more omega 3's there's loads of mercury out there, and it LOVES to hide in fish!

[starslayer]

According to what I've read, kinnison, and I could be wrong on this, but I don't think that there have been any reputable, far-reaching studies that have been able to establish a clear link between better health and higher anti-oxidant intake (that is, intake beyond what an average American gets; I'm not disputing that antioxidants in and of themselves are good for you). Or, at least, that the body of evidence does not show this, especially when antioxidant supplements are considered.

And Vitamin E is, well, an interesting subject. Just from the perspective of it being fat-soluble, I don't think taking more than the recommended daily dose is a good idea. Water soluble vitamins, like C and B, get eliminated from the body through the kidneys each day; fat-soluble ones tend to build up, and aren't eliminated nearly as quickly. Incidentally, this is why you shouldn't eat the livers of very large carnivores, like bear: they contain lethal amounts of Vitamin A (another fat-soluble vitamin). Anyways, I'd be cautious just because of the possibility of a toxic level of build up (though I consider such a possibility in this case unlikely). Also according to the book Bad Medicine by Christopher Wanjek, studies were showing in 2001 that Vitamin E supplements were interfering with statins; I do not know the reputability of this claim. Anyone with more experience in this area (Knife, mr. friendly guy, etc.) have any better information?

The mercury in fish issue is also not much of one, depending on which fish you eat and where it was harvested; salmon has levels that are quite safe, IIRC, while tuna and swordfish have more dangerous levels (though not especially so, if you moderate your intake).

[kinnison]

Apparently vitamin E is a bit of a half-way house between the other fat-solubles and the water-solubles in terms of half-life; probably because it is consumed in the course of doing its job.

Mercury in oily fish is an interesting subject. It appears that the bigger (and therefore the nearer the top of the food chain) the fish is, the higher levels of mercury and various alphabet-spaghetti contaminants is likely to be everything else being equal. So much so that I believe official advice in the UK is for pregnant women to eat tuna no more than once per week. Contamination of such fish as sardines, herring and mackerel therefore ought to be minimal.

As for vitamin E and statins - well, don't get me started on the subject of statins. But a few points about that; vitamin E (and yes, in far larger amounts than any nation's RDA) has been shown in epidemiological studies to have a protective effect against heart disease of its own; C-reactive protein and homocysteine levels both have a much higher correlation with heart disease risk than blood level of cholesterol has; and statins have a number of rather serious risks associated with them, including congestive heart failure, rhabdomyolysis and sudden death due to suicidal depression. One of the unwanted side effects of statins (depression of coenzyme Q10 levels, which causes many of the other side effects) can be remedied simply by ingesting coenzyme Q10, fairly cheaply available as a supplement. In other words, interfering with statins is a feature, not a bug. Unless your cholesterol level started off astronomically high, that is.

Chardok, you're probably right. A typical 1000mg fish oil capsule has maybe 10iu of vitamin E in it and that's probably enough to compensate. I'd go a bit further than that, actually; if the fish oil capsules you are thinking of buying don't have added vitamin E then don't buy them, IMHO. Apart from anything else, without it the fish oil might go rancid in storage, and rancid oil is both disgusting and not very good for the health at all.

[starslayer]

Mercury in oily fish is an interesting subject. It appears that the bigger (and therefore the nearer the top of the food chain) the fish is, the higher levels of mercury and various alphabet-spaghetti contaminants is likely to be everything else being equal. So much so that I believe official advice in the UK is for pregnant women to eat tuna no more than once per week. Contamination of such fish as sardines, herring and mackerel therefore ought to be minimal.

Well, yeah. Poisons always get concentrated at the top of the food chain. But advising everyone to stay away from oily fish because of mercury is foolishness.

As for vitamin E and statins - well, don't get me started on the subject of statins. But a few points about that; vitamin E (and yes, in far larger amounts than any nation's RDA) has been shown in epidemiological studies to have a protective effect against heart disease of its own; C-reactive protein and homocysteine levels both have a much higher correlation with heart disease risk than blood level of cholesterol has; and statins have a number of rather serious risks associated with them, including congestive heart failure, rhabdomyolysis and sudden death due to suicidal depression. One of the unwanted side effects of statins (depression of coenzyme Q10 levels, which causes many of the other side effects) can be remedied simply by ingesting coenzyme Q10, fairly cheaply available as a supplement. In other words, interfering with statins is a feature, not a bug. Unless your cholesterol level started off astronomically high, that is.

Yeah, statins have side effects, potentially very bad ones. So do most any drugs. However, if diet and exercise just aren't doing enough (or doing it quickly enough), statins can be a valuable resource to turn to. I found it relevant to mention this effect because Chardok specifically stated he was taking one. At least according to what Wanjek wrote, the studies seemed to indicate that supplemental vitamin E interfered with the statin's operation, not that taking extra Q10, which Wanjek did not mention, countered one of the statin's side effects.

Chardok, you're probably right. A typical 1000mg fish oil capsule has maybe 10iu of vitamin E in it and that's probably enough to compensate. I'd go a bit further than that, actually; if the fish oil capsules you are thinking of buying don't have added vitamin E then don't buy them, IMHO.

A typical American diet provides more than enough vitamin E for a healthy body; in Chardok's case, where he's trying to eat much better than an average American, he should have even more of the stuff. I somehow doubt not taking extra vitamin E because of the extra fish oil is going to hurt him.

Apart from anything else, without it the fish oil might go rancid in storage

How does this follow? Why should vitamin E have any effect whatsoever on bacterial growth in what amounts to fat and water?

[Broomstick]

The mercury in fish issue is also not much of one, depending on which fish you eat and where it was harvested; salmon has levels that are quite safe, IIRC, while tuna and swordfish have more dangerous levels (though not especially so, if you moderate your intake).

Actually, it is an issue - there are cases where people who ate a lot of fish have turned up with mercury poisoning. As you say, which fish you eat is important, but that knowledge is by no means universal, and some of the most desirable fish for cultural or culinary reasons can be high risk fish.

Also, mercury is much more an issue for woman intending to have children, and for those children as well. A level of mercury that an adult man can tolerate without noticeable effects does markedly increase the chances of neurological problems if you're looking at either a pregnant woman or an small child.

There is also more than just mercury in fish that's a problem - they tend to concentrate just about everything as you go up the food chain. The solution is to eat low on the food chain and to eat fish in moderation - but we all know a lot of people aren't terribly good at moderation.

[kinnison]

Starslayer, AFAIK rancidity has a definite oxidative component to it. Rancid butter and rancid vegetable oils become rancid by different paths. Actually, all rancid means is "off".

Even if bacteria have quite a lot to do with the development of rancidity in oils, AFAIK the bugs that do it need oxygen - and vitamin E and oxygen don't mix. They destroy each other. In fact, that is one of the physiological functions of vitamin E - preventing oxidation of the unsaturated fats that form a large part of cell walls.

Which leads me to another point. It is reasonably well known that omega 6 and omega 3 oils are both essential, although this fact is not terribly important given that omega 6 is very often present in extremely large excess. However, what is not quite so well known is that all unsaturated fats come in two varieties, all-cis and "not all-cis" usually known as trans fats. Unfortunately, the trans version of any double bond is usually more stable than the cis form and is created by heating. Unfortunately, because trans-unsaturated fats are useless for the functions usually carried out by polyunsaturates but are nevertheless very susceptible to free radical damage - in other words they have all the disadvantages of unsaturates and none of the advantages.

The main source of trans fats in anyone's diet is processed polyunsaturates or those that have been repeatedly subjected to extreme heat. Ergo, if you must deep-fry use saturated fats or monounsaturates such as peanut oil. Yes, fries fried in dripping or lard are better than those fried in a deep frier filled with sunflower oil - unless you are lucky and it's just been filled. And, of course, this is yet another reason not to eat processed junk. Yet another reason still is that processed food often contains hydrogenated fat - which contains very high levels of this stuff because of the way it's made.

It always, always, always comes back to this, doesn't it? Processed food bad - natural food good. Of course, the odd bacon sandwich or frozen TV dinner isn't going to kill you - but live on them and...

[AMT]

Since the ultimate origin of omega-3's seems to be plants, I would expect that cutting back (or cutting out) processed foods and eating a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables would also be beneficial.... which has been backed up by various studies.

So... less processed food, more plant-based food, more fish, less red meat/fowl.... Haven't we heard this before?

Drill down deeper you get into choosing eggs produced in such a manner as to result in higher omega-3's, eating wild fish (responsibly harvested, one hopes) and other complications, but the basic concept in the prior paragraph would certainly steer a person in the right direction with little effort.

From what I read its not the plants themselves, since we can't break it down directly from them, but from eating animals that EAT those plants, and break it down for us.

to wit:

Bucolic, sun-drenched pastures supported a complex array of grasses, and cattle used their sensitive tongues to pick and choose the ripest patches of clover, millet, and sweet grass; their rumens then turned the cellulose that humans can't digest into foods that we can: milk, butter, cheese, and, eventually, beef, all of them rich in omega-3s.

So... stop the fucking meat farms already!

[starslayer]

Starslayer, AFAIK rancidity has a definite oxidative component to it. Rancid butter and rancid vegetable oils become rancid by different paths. Actually, all rancid means is "off".

Even if bacteria have quite a lot to do with the development of rancidity in oils, AFAIK the bugs that do it need oxygen - and vitamin E and oxygen don't mix. They destroy each other. In fact, that is one of the physiological functions of vitamin E - preventing oxidation of the unsaturated fats that form a large part of cell walls.

I don't think fat going bad necessarily needs oxidation to happen; you really don't need to oxidize fats to break them down, though it can be easier that way (and even if you do need to oxidize them, there are several ways to oxidize something; you do not need oxygen to do it, nor oxygen containing chemicals). I'm pretty sure there are anaerobic bacteria that feed on fats (well, in this case, fatty acids), and they'd be bad news too, if rarer than aerobic bacteria. It's the bacteria's waste products that are harmful, and that's true almost across the board. Besides, the pills are almost certainly pasteurized to prevent bacterial contamination, and have non-porous shells, IIRC.

Vitamin E and oxygen do not "destroy" each other; the two substances continuously react and break apart, and eventually reach equilibrium amounts; vitamin E does not eliminate the presence of oxygen in an environment, though it most certainly can reduce it under the right conditions (remember, it works most effectively in places like the human body). The amount present in the supplement may be enough to effectively suppress aerobic bacterial growth, but from what I know, I consider the slightly possibly slightly elevated risk of rancidity to not be worth considering, unless you have or can find data to the contrary.

Oh, and by the way, I just found a paper saying that the role of vitamin E is very poorly understood, and it may not even be an important antioxidant. This would make some sense, considering the two of the most important antioxidants, glutathione and SOD (superoxide dismutase), are made by the body itself, and the concentration in cells of glutathione especially dwarfs that of the vitamins.

[Darth Wong]

I know quite a few people who hate eating fish. I'm tempted to throw this in their faces, but it wouldn't do any good. They're as stubborn about their diet as Southern Baptists are about creationism.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Yeah, I don't get those people at all. At. All. I grew up by the sea, and I know of all its bounty and how good it is for me. If I'm going to slum and order junk food I always go for the fish and chips instead of a cheeseburger, since at least I'm getting something redeeming out of the meal instead of nothing at all. Broiled fish can be incredibly good when prepared right, and smoked salmon is simply awesome, and shellfish has gotten a negative reputation because they're 'bottom feeders' when they have many advantages in their own right as well.

[Darth Wong]

One interesting thing about the way white people eat fish is that they seem to be unhappy when the fish looks like ... well, fish. When the Chinese cook fish, they leave the skin on, and the head is still there. It still looks like a fish. When white people eat fish, they get rid of the head and the skin and all the bones, so it just looks like a white or orange piece of meat. When you present white people with fish that is prepared in the Chinese manner, they always give you that "I'm trying not to look disgusted because it would be impolite" look.

[weemadando]

I think that can be said for nearly all western cuisine. If it reminds us at all of where it come from people become very uneasy about it.

[wautd]

Starslayer, AFAIK rancidity has a definite oxidative component to it. Rancid butter and rancid vegetable oils become rancid by different paths. Actually, all rancid means is "off".

Even if bacteria have quite a lot to do with the development of rancidity in oils, AFAIK the bugs that do it need oxygen - and vitamin E and oxygen don't mix. They destroy each other. In fact, that is one of the physiological functions of vitamin E - preventing oxidation of the unsaturated fats that form a large part of cell walls.

I don't think fat going bad necessarily needs oxidation to happen; you really don't need to oxidize fats to break them down, though it can be easier that way (and even if you do need to oxidize them, there are several ways to oxidize something; you do not need oxygen to do it, nor oxygen containing chemicals).

Rancidity can either be caused by oxidation or hydrolysis, but for commercial fish oil, you can bet your ass rancidity will be caused by oxidation. I can't think of any type of fat that's more susceptible to oxidation, and since commercial fish oil is refinded anyway it should be sterile.

[kinnison]

OK then, starslayer; perhaps you're right. Anyway, oxidative damage to the oil, whether or not that constitutes rancidity, is a real possibility and that's what the vitamin E is for.

Even if the capsule shell and the bottle are both completely impervious to oxygen - doubtful over a several-year timescale, the usual shelf life of supplements - one still has to deal with the oxygen introduced into the oil during processing. While it is undoubtedly possible to nitrogen-purge the oil itself, do all the processing and capsule-filling in an inert atmosphere and fill the bottle with nitrogen before sealing - somehow I doubt that most manufacturers go to all that trouble.

As for the business about vitamin E/oxygen reaction - well, maybe. Two things; simplification on my part - and frankly I doubt it. As I understand it, most antioxidants work by reacting with highly-reactive free radicals (thus making another free radical, but a much less active one) and thus getting rid of them. Eventually, two of the tocopheryl radicals floating around will join with each other and then there are none. Free-radical damage is often more of a problem because it is a chain reaction, and antioxidants are chain-stoppers.

The reason for vitamin E (and beta carotene, and many others) forming less active radicals? Quantum mechanics. Yes, ugh indeed. Briefly; just about all the common antioxidants of this type have either long chains of conjugated double bonds or aromatic rings as part of the molecule, which lowers the energy of the loose electron by delocalisation. I'm afraid that if I ever was able to prove this using the (extremely esoteric) maths then my ability to do it evaporated many years ago - it's 30 years since I looked at theoretical chemistry and quantum-mechanics maths, which look like the doodlings of a spider hooked on LSD at the best of times.

Finally - vitamin E vs. other antioxidants like SOD and glutathione? Again, I am quite prepared to be proved wrong; but AFAIK both of those work in an aqueous medium and the cell wall is not such a medium. The body contains quite a lot of fat enclosed in some sort of vacuole, too - especially mine, unfortunately.

[wautd]

With regards to Vit E, I won't say anthing about in vitro, but as an antioxidant for in vitro use it's not really that good. It's main component is α-tocoferol, which has the lowest antioxidant efficacy of the 4 isomers. Shoot, tocopherols can even act as a pro-oxidant in some cases. I get the feeling that the industry is using it because they've always been using it.