Whole Food Tomato Protects the Lung Against Pulmonary Oxidative Stress

Pulmonary oxidative stress is a condition of oxidative stress in the lung.

The lung is a breathing organ containing a pair of spongy, air-filled organs located on either side of the chest (thorax) by taking oxygen to the blood vessels then passing them to all parts of our body.

Furthermore, the lung also exhales the waste product called carbon dioxide, through breathing.

Oxidative stress is a result of an imbalance of the levels of free radicals compared to the antioxidant enzymes in the body.

Oxidative stress is either expressed by overexpression of free radicals or reduced levels of antioxidants or both.

Free radicals can be everywhere in the environment such as the air we breathe, the foods we eat. they can also be produced by cells' metabolism in the body.

Believe it or not, free radicals in moderate amounts are necessary for our body to function, including NO for muscle relaxation.

Epidemiologically, oxidative stress has been found to induce lipid and protein oxidation and cell DNA damage.

According to the free radical theory, aging posits caused by the accumulation of damage inflicted by reactive oxygen species (ROS) associated with various chronic diseases such as atherosclerosis, cancer, diabetics, rheumatoid arthritis, post-ischemic perfusion injury, myocardial infarction, cardiovascular diseases, chronic inflammation, stroke.

In the lung, oxidative stress also was shown to elevate the risk of the pathogenesis of the chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Tomato is red, edible fruit, genus Solanum, belonging to family Solanaceae, native to South America. Because of its health benefits, the tomato is grown worldwide for the commercial purpose
and often in the greenhouse.

With an aim to find a natural and potential whole food for the treatment of diseases associated with pulmonary oxidative stress, researchers investigated the dietary supplementation with a known source of antioxidants (tomato juice, TJ) in the protection of the lung from injury caused by breathing hyperoxic gas.

The study included the examination of the results from the selected neonatal mice (C57BL6/J) breathed either 65% O2 (hyperoxia) or room air from birth until postnatal day 7 (P7d).

At P56d, TJ protects the lung cell integrity and viability by increasing the levels of total antioxidant capacity (TAC), decreasing oxidative stress and reversing the hyperoxia-induced increase in bronchiolar smooth muscle.

Furthermore, injection of TJ alone also decreased the protein involved in the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines.


In hyperoxia, TJ increased TNF-α expression and did not alter the hyperoxia-induced increase in leukocyte numbers.


In other words, TJ protects the lung against oxidative stress by inhibiting and exhibiting certain proteins associated with the proinflammation without increasing the production of immune white blood cells via its pulmonary antioxidants.

Based on these results, Dr. Bouch S, the lead scientist said, "TJ supplementation during and after neonatal exposure to hyperoxia protects the lung from some but not all aspects of hyperoxia-induced injury".

In other to reveal additional information about tomato anti pulmonary oxidative stress effect, researchers examined bioactive compound lycopene extracted from tomatoes in pulmonary fibrosis (PF) in an animal model.


The study included 60 Sprague-Dawley rats induced pulmonary fibrosis (PF) by BLM randomly divided into 3 groups of 20 rats each for a normal control group (group C), BLM-treated group (group M), and lycopene + BLM-treated group (group L).

Additionally, the rats in groups M and L were subjected to intratracheal instillation of BLM to induce PF; group C served as a sham control (intratracheal instillation of normal saline). Lycopene diluted with olive oil was administered at a dose of 5 mg/kg body weight once a day in group L after BLM instillation, and groups C and M were treated with the same amounts of olive oil.

The lung coefficients in group L treated with lycopene were reduced (day 14, P < .01) as well as the extents of alveolitis (days 7 and 14, P < .05) and PF (day 14 and 28, P < .05) compared with group M.


The lycopene treated group also showed significantly reduced levels of proteins associated with the immune system response against the acute phase of infection.
Furthermore, lycopene levels of oxidative stress markers in the lung observed by the decreased levels of malondialdehyde plasma.

In other words, lycopene protected the lung of the tested rat by reducing oxidative stress via the stimulation of the production of antioxidant enzymes.

Taken altogether, tomatoes processed a high amount of bioactive compound lycopene may be considered supplements for the prevention and treatment of diseases associated with pulmonary oxidative stress, pending to the confirmation of the larger sample size and multicenter human study.

Intake of lycopene in the form of supplements should be taken with extreme care to prevent overdose acute liver toxicity.

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Author Biography
Kyle J. Norton (Scholar, Master of Nutrition, All right reserved)
Health article writer and researcher; Over 10.000 articles and research papers have been written and published online, including worldwide health, ezine articles, article base, health blogs, self-growth, best before it's news, the karate GB daily, etc.,.
Named TOP 50 MEDICAL ESSAYS FOR ARTISTS & AUTHORS TO READ by Disilgold.com Named 50 of the best health Tweeters Canada - Huffington Post
Nominated for shorty award over last 4 years
Some articles have been used as references in medical research, such as international journal Pharma and Bioscience, ISSN 0975-6299.

Sources
(1) Impact of Dietary Tomato Juice on Changes in Pulmonary Oxidative Stress, Inflammation and Structure Induced by Neonatal Hyperoxia in Mice (Mus musculus) by Bouch S1, Harding R1, O'Reilly M1, Wood LG2, Sozo F. (PubMed)
(2) Lycopene from tomatoes partially alleviates the bleomycin-induced experimental pulmonary fibrosis in rats by Zhou C1, Han W, Zhang P, Cai M, Wei D, Zhang C. (PubMed)