Baby carrots 🥕 may be the secret to beautiful skin, study reveals

“Make sure to grab an extra helping of carrots for dinner. New research finds that carrots aren’t just good for vision, they also do wonders for the skin. Study authors say that even a few helpings of baby carrots 🥕 each week is enough to make a difference!

The new study presented at the NUTRITION 2024 conference, the flagship annual meeting of the American Society for Nutrition, found that snacking on a bag of baby carrots 🥕 three times a week increased the levels of skin carotenoids in young adults.

High skin carotenoid levels have a link to increased antioxidant protection and a lower risk for chronic diseases — including cancer and heart disease. A high carotenoid level also boosts a person’s immune function”.

https://studyfinds.org/baby-carrots-beautiful-skin/

Vitamin A 🥕 and a gene called BC01.🧬

Eating a handful of baby carrots 🥕 3 times per week might be a great way to increase your carotenoids, but how do your genes 🧬 help you to convert the Beta-carotenes in your diet to possibly the more beneficial retinol.

Vitamin A is a family of nutrients.

Vitamin A is more than just a single nutrient but a broad group of related nutrients, each providing us with differing health 💪🏻 benefits. Below is a summary showing the differences between them.

Carotenoids (found in plant foods)🥕

Carotenes

Alpha-carotene, Beta-carotene, Gamma-carotene, Delta-carotene, Epsilon-carotene

Xanthophylls

Astaxanthin, Beta-cryptoxanthin, Canthaxanthin, Fucoxanthin, Lutein, Neoxanthin, Violaxanthin and Zeaxanthin.

Carotenoids act much in the same way as retinoids in providing us with unique health benefits.  Carotenoids function as antioxidant and anti-inflammatory ❄️ nutrients, with some having a special role to play in the protection of our health.

Retinoids (found in animal foods)🐄 🐟🍳

Retinol, Retinal, Retinoic acid and Retinyl esters.

There are some specific immune 🦠, inflammatory 🔥, genetic 🧬, and reproductive-related benefits of vitamin A that can only be obtained from the retinoid (animal source) forms of the vitamin.

It’s also extremely important for maintaining healthy skin 🥰, as retinoids can significantly reduce wrinkles by producing higher levels of collagen.

Individuals that have one T allele in both of BC01 rs7501331 and rs12934922 have approximately 60% lower ability to convert Beta-carotene found in plants 🥕into provitamin A.