BarleyMax is a premium, raw, organic barley grass juice powder. The benefits of eating BarleyMax go way beyond just the vitamins and minerals listed on the Nutrition Facts panel. The testing reported here reveals that BarleyMax prevents DNA damage. A Comet assay of colon cancer cells found that a dilute solution of BarleyMax was able to protect the cells from DNA damage induced by hydrogen peroxide.
Why You Should Care About DNA Damage
There are several reasons why DNA damage should be avoided. Mutations in DNA, especially in the DNA controlling cell growth, can lead to errors that may cause diseases like cancer. Damaged DNA can stop cells from working smoothly, leading to organ dysfunction, failure and accelerated aging. Your body has repair mechanisms to fix damaged DNA, but you can overwhelm the system or even damage the DNA encoding the repair mechanisms.
How Your Body Prevents DNA Damage
Our bodies have a three-fold defense against DNA damage—enzymes which disarm free radicals, small molecules which absorb free radicals (like uric acid), and dietary antioxidants to boost protection of DNA, lipids, and proteins.
What is Oxidative Damage?
The cells of our bodies are constantly bombarded with free radicals produced from the “fire” of oxygen-based metabolism. These free radicals cause biological “rust,” making the systems of the body seize up and grind to a halt. Free radical damage plays a major role in disease and untimely deaths.
How the Study was Conducted
In this study, the HT29 cell line, a human colorectal adenocarcinoma cell line widely used as a colon cancer model, was selected. HT29 cells were incubated with BarleyMax at various concentrations along with hydrogen peroxide for 1 hour. After thorough rinsing the cells were mixed with agarose gel and laid onto a microscope slide. Cells were then lysed, electrophoresed, the DNA was stained, and then individual cells were scored. Damaged DNA is shorter than intact DNA and moves quicker under the electrophoresis field, forming a tail that appears like a comet when visualized with fluorescent dye. The amount of DNA in the tail is quantified compared to the amount remaining within the cell nucleus. A bigger tail indicates greater DNA damage.
The Results of the Study
As shown in Figure 1, BarleyMax at 0.03% significantly reduces DNA damage. At 0.25% BarleyMax or higher the cells were almost completely protected; damage was reduced to about 10% of the negative control value.
This Kind of Result is Also Seen with Other Foods
This was an in vitro experiment, so the data cannot be directly applied to DNA protection in people. The Comet assay is widely used and accepted as a very sensitive method to detect DNA damage in single cells. In vitro results like these with BarleyMax do correlate well with DNA protection of white blood cells in volunteers who consume kiwifruit juice (1), and broccoli sprouts (2). Also, the Comet assay was able to detect DNA protective effects of eating spinach and tomato puree (3), blood orange juice (4) and carrot juice (5). Whole diet effects can even be captured. The fecal water of volunteers who ate a diet high in fat and meat, when compared to a low-fat, low-meat, high-fiber diet, caused twice as much DNA damage in a Comet assay (6).
Conclusion
So, BarleyMax has DNA-protective properties, possibly by multiple mechanisms. For maximal protection an optimal diet and lifestyle must be followed. BarleyMax can be part of that protection.
What is BarleyMax?
BarleyMax is raw, organic barley grass juice powder, from young barley grass and alfalfa. It is the juice from a whole food, replete with all of the vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, and enzymes of these very potent green foods. It has been carefully processed so that as much as possible of the vibrancy, taste, and life of the fresh juice is preserved for convenient consumption.
References
- Collins BH, Horska A, Hotten PM, Riddoch C, Collins AR (2001) Kiwifruit protects against oxidative DNA damage in human cells and in vitro. Nutr Cancer 39:148–53. doi: 10.1207/s15327914nc391_20
- Gill CIR, Haldar S, Porter S, Matthews S, Sullivan S, Coulter J, et al (2004) The effect of cruciferous and leguminous sprouts on genotoxicity, in vitro and in vivo. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 13:1199–205. doi: 10.1158/1055-9965.1199.13.7
- Porrini M, Riso P, Oriani G (2002) Spinach and tomato consumption increases lymphocyte DNA resistance to oxidative stress but this is not related to cell carotenoid concentrations. Eur J Nutr 41:95–100. doi: 10.1007/s003940200014
- Guarnieri S, Riso P, Porrini M (2007) Orange juice vs vitamin C: effect on hydrogen peroxide-induced DNA damage in mononuclear blood cells. Br J Nutr 97:639–643. doi: 10.1017/S0007114507657948
- Lee H-J, Park YK, Kang M-H (2011) The effect of carrot juice, β-carotene supplementation on lymphocyte DNA damage, erythrocyte antioxidant enzymes and plasma lipid profiles in Korean smoker. Nutr Res Pract 5:540–547. doi: 10.4162/nrp.2011.5.6.540
- Rieger MA, Parlesak A, Pool-Zobel BL, Rechkemmer G, Bode C (1999) A diet high in fat and meat but low in dietary fibre increases the genotoxic potential of “faecal water.” Carcinogenesis 20:2311–6. doi: 10.1093/carcin/20.12.2311
Explanation of the Figure
Damaged DNA is shorter than intact DNA and moves quicker under the electrophoresis field, forming a tail that appears like a “comet” when visualized with fluorescent dye. A bigger tail indicates greater DNA damage; this is indicated by the height of the bar on the graph; the taller the bar, the more DNA damage.
- The first column is a negative control, a “vehicle” control; the experiment procedure itself does not induce noticeable DNA damage.
- The second column is a positive control, where the cells are incubated with hydrogen peroxide. Concentration of the hydrogen peroxide is 200 micromolar. Clearly there is a lot of DNA damage.
- The next columns are cells incubated with the same amount of hydrogen peroxide and increasing amounts of BarleyMax.
- As the amount of BarleyMax was increased the cells were protected more and more until there was almost no damage of the DNA, compared to the “vehicle” control.
- Each treatment with BarleyMax is twice as much as the next column on the left.