Compounds In Cocoa Shells Could Help Fight Obesity

(Genuine News Daily) – Compounds in cocoa shells could help fight obesity. Obesity alters cells in ways that can lead to some health issues such as inflammation and damage to metabolic functions. This can affect the ability to use insulin and make energy.

Now, the researchers have found that three compounds in cocoa bean shells could prevent these cell changes.

These three compounds including protocatechuic acid, epicatechin, and procyanidin B2 are found in cocoa, green tea, and coffee.

The researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana‐Champaign and other institutions have published their findings in a recent Molecular Nutrition & Food Research paper.

They found that cocoa shell extract could help treat obesity-related effects in fat and immune cells from mice. They looked at whether cocoa shell extract can affect the association between adipocytes and macrophages that could prevent the mitochondrial damage and obesity-induced insulin resistance.

“We observed that the extract was able to maintain the mitochondria and their function, modulating the inflammatory process and maintaining the adipocytes’ sensitivity to insulin,” says lead study author Miguel Rebollo-Hernanz, Ph.D.

For the findings, the researchers performed cell experiments using computer models and bioinformatics. They analyzed the effect of each compound on the adipocyte-macrophage interactions.

They found that treating the cells with either cocoa shell extract prevented the damage to mitochondria and reduced fat accumulation in the cells.

“Assuming that these phenolics were the main actors in this extract, we can say that consuming them could prevent mitochondrial dysfunction in adipose tissue,” says Miguel Rebollo-Hernanz, Ph.D.