Is it beneficial to drink red wine in moderate doses? The eternal question that numerous researchers have studied and continue to study today.
Countless unofficial articles point out the medical benefits that red wine can have for our health, such as antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and lipid-regulating effects.
Now, a new study funded by the Seneca Foundation (22015/PI/22, Science and Technology Agency of the Region of Murcia) and led by the Murcian Angel Gil Izquierdo, Scientific Researcher at the Centre for Soil Science and Applied Biology of Segura (CEBAS, CSIC) and involving the REM Group of the Catholic University San Antonio of Murcia (UCAM) led by Dr. José Antonio Gabaldón Hernández and the University of Montpellier-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) (Dr. Thierry Durand, France) further clarifies these doubts and evaluates the effect of plant bioactive compounds of viticultural origin on health (polyphenols and compounds of lipid origin).
Gil Izquierdo focuses on how the biological activities of polyphenols and n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids affect oxidation, inflammation, cancer, cardiovascular and degenerative diseases. The study is based on the union of the two types of compounds in a new molecule called lipophenol, with the aim of demonstrating their beneficial effects on health.
Recall that many foods contain polyphenols, including grapes, which contain resveratrol, one of the most important polyphenols. Until now, the handicap was its low availability in the human body, which limited the ability of resveratrol to express its beneficial properties for health to the fullest extent, but now, with the study led by Angel Gil, the aim is to find the union of this compound with fatty acids in all the phases of winemaking, from the vine and its physiological parts, through the must and all the winemaking processes to the final wine itself. Thus, the presence of the union of both molecules in the form of resveratrol lipophenol in wine and thus in the human body after ingestion could lead to a better absorption and bioavailability of resveratrol, which would confirm and strengthen the health benefits of red wine. In fact, up to the date of development of the project, it has been possible to detect the presence of resveratrol lipophenols in the red wines of Bodega Baigorri S.A.U. as well as in vine leaves, lees and other intermediate stages of the winemaking process, which opens up a new field of research in wine and may increase the degree of presence of resveratrol in the human body through these molecules in addition to the free resveratrol already described.”
