A Perspective of the Research on Food Factors in Human Health: A Return to the Mechanistic Approach

Abstract

Food is a mixture of several nutrients and non-nutrients. The functions of food in human health can be categorized as its primary function in nutrition, its secondary function in palatability and its tertiary function in bioregulation. Nutrients contribute mainly to the primary function, while many non-nutrients in foods and foodstuffs are strongly associated with the secondary and/or tertiary functions. Individual food ingredients and ingredients as a whole are the so-called food factors. Much interest has arisen in the tertiary function of food factors related to the prevention of lifestyle-related diseases and promoting health in an aging society. This is why many studies evaluating the tertiary functions of food factors are now in progress all over the world. This symposium aims to present cutting-edge knowledge from celebrated Asian professors on the molecular mechanisms for the tertiary functions of food factors, in particular, polyphenols in soybeans and green tea, and n-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids in fish. In this context, this article will briefly review recent trends in research on the tertiary function of food factors.