Green Tea and Polyphenols

What are Polyphenols?
Polyphenols are compounds found in nature. More specifically they are found in plants and provide coloring for some. Their purpose appears to be a potent, natural antioxidant. There are many plants that we consume that contain polyphenols. Concentrations are high in Olive oil and Green Tea and have been the subject of many health articles and promoted to enhance your health.
How do Polyphenols work?
These antioxidants eliminate free radicals, unstable molecules that are the major cause of both aging and disease, in both plants and humans. Free radicals continually attack the body. Free radicals are a normal product of metabolism and result in a process called oxidation. Polyphenols and other antioxidants, including beta carotene (a vitamin A precursor), vitamin C, vitamin E, and selenium, scavenge these free radicals and help to prevent formation of unstable oxygen molecules, known as oxidation. Oxidation can damage healthy cells in the body and have been linked to many diseases including cancer, heart disease and stroke. Polyphenols not only work to prevent diseases but may also help to reduce abnormal cells and inflammation; get rid of cancer causing agents and restore cells back to normal health.
What foods contain Polyphenols?
Unfortunately, polyphenols have a quick life span (short half life) of about 3 hours, thus the scientific reason behind researchers' recommendation to drink green tea a minimum of 8 times a day. EGCG, the most abundant and powerful of green tea's 5 main catechins, is dubbed the 'super antioxidant' because it is 200 times more powerful than the popular antioxidant vitamin E. Just one example is a subgroup of polyphenols, exclusive to green tea, called catechins. These extremely high levels of polyphenols deliver green tea's unique results in several ways.

Green Tea is the #1 source of polyphenols. They include red wine, olive oil, black and green tea. There are many but there are only a few, which contain particularly high levels.
And, research at the University of Geneva, in Switzerland, indicate that green tea raises metabolic rates In addition to caffeine, green tea's catechin polyphenols raise thermogenesis (the rate at which calories are burned) and hence increases energy expenditure. And, research at the University of Geneva, in Switzerland, indicate that green tea raises metabolic rates and speed up fat oxidation. In addition to caffeine, green tea's catechin polyphenols raise thermogenesis (the rate at which calories are burned) and hence increases energy expenditure. And, research at the University of Geneva, in Switzerland, indicate that green tea raises metabolic rates and speed up fat oxidation.

In addition to caffeine, green tea's catechin polyphenols raise thermogenesis (the rate at which calories are burned) and hence increases energy expenditure. And, research at the University of Geneva, in Switzerland, indicate that green tea raises metabolic rates and speed up fat oxidation. In addition to caffeine, green tea's catechin polyphenols raise thermogenesis (the rate at which calories are burned) and hence increases energy expenditure. Not only may green tea protect and heal the body from disease but also clinical trials, conducted by the University of Geneva, in Switzerland, indicate that green tea raises metabolic rates and speed up fat oxidation.
Research is still continuing with green tea and more health benefits continue to be discovered. For instance, EGCG's may one day play a role in treatment of mad cow disease (Nature Structural and Molecular Biology, DOI:10.1038/nsmb743). And the formation of unstable oxygen molecules in the body is unavoidable. Aging, smoke, and environmental pollutants are all sources of the damaging free radicals. Japan and China have benefited from drinking green tea vs. black tea, like the rest of us, for centuries. The west is just now catching on to the benefits of green tea. With green tea being no more harmful than a cup of coffee (and actually containing less caffeine) there's no reason why you shouldn't begin today to benefit from green tea too.
Chemical name:
Various
Also known as:
Green Tea Polyphenols, Green Tea Water Extract, Black Tea Polyphenols, Black Tea Water Extract, Epigallocatechin Gallate (EGCG), Polyphenon E (Mitsui-Norin, Ltd.), Topical Polyphenon E (Epitome Pharmaceuticals Ltd.)
Category:
Phytochemical
More information on the benefits of green tea can be found at
http://www.natural-weight-loss-programs.com/greentea.htm
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Tea Manufacturers India

Tea and Wine: Educating the palate
Why do connoisseurs pay more for a Chateau Neuf du Pape or a Merlot and insist on a particular year over the others? And how much did you pay for it? When was the last time you bought wine which said ‘French Table Wine, and poured out of a box?
On the other hand why do the same people feel content buying tea out of a box, which says Indian or Ceylon tea?
Tea, like wine, has qualities that depend on its geographical location. So just as a red wine from Chile will taste differently from a red wine from France, orthodox teas from India will be very different from orthodox teas from Ceylon or Kenya. Wines in France, too, will have regional differences with a Cotes du Rhone having a taste and bouquet unlike that of a Burgundy or Loire grape.
Then, of course there is the difference between vineyards within the region as it is with tea estates, which depend not only on the geographical location, but also on how the property is run and its quality controls. Similarly, among the teas in India, Terai teas will taste differently from Darjeeling, Assam or Nilgiris.
But once you master it, becoming a connoisseur of tea can be as much fun, as fascinating, if not healthier than being a wine connoisseur. All of this may be bewildering at first. And then there are the different qualities of wine of each vineyard as there are different grades of tea of each estate.
Normally, the so-called ‘estate-fresh' specialty teas that you buy in the supermarket gets there after passing through the hands of a number of middle-men, often sitting in warehouses of dusty ports for months before it reaches your cup. Unlike wines, though, tea does not do well with age.
Try a cup of tea, which has reached you directly within days of being plucked.
Most tea estates limit their expertise to the manufacture of one type of specialty tea. Nuxalbari Tea Estate India is probably one of the very few gardens that is proud to make all three different types of specialty Indian teas with equal finesse.
Upon espying a choice piece of virgin land, the young man would scoop a handful of earth, bury his nose in it, inhale deeply and pronounce, "good, plant," or "rubbish, move on." Family legend has it that he built his fortune led entirely by his nose. In 1899, my great-grandfather, the Nawab of Jalpaiguri, traveled on elephant back across the swampy jungles of northeast India, clearing great swathes of land and planting delicate tea saplings imported from China.
It was first established in 1884 by a British tea planter, and bought by the Nawab in 1910, who then doubled its production by planting areas thought to be unfit by the earlier owner. Nuxalbari, though, was one of the few tea plantations that he did not plant himself entirely. By the end of his life he owned 22 tea plantations from upper Assam to the Dooars.
His genes survive. The Nawab of Jalpaiguri, Musharraf Hussain was one of the first Indians to make tea planting his passion.

Green Tea and The "Asian Paradox"

While it is almost certainly not a cure, however, many studies appear to show that lifelong green tea drinking does in fact reduce the risk of cancer in later life. Of all the controversial claims about green tea's health benefits, the one that draws the most scepticism is the claim that it could be a cure for cancer.
The biggest piece of evidence in support of this theory is known as the ‘Asian paradox'. The Asian paradox, according to researchers at Yale, is that Asia has very high levels of cigarette smoking, yet lower cancer rates than Europe or America. The researchers believe that the difference between the places lies in the Asians' consumption of large amounts of green tea (over a litre a day on average).
This is some of the most encouraging research yet, as methotrexate is a drug with many unpleasant side effects, and replacing it with green tea could work very well. Studies at Murcia University in Spain found that a chemical in green tea called EGCG is very similar to the cancer drug methotrexate, in that it appears to kill cancer cells in the same way. Other studies have supported this view: one study comparing elderly Japanese people who drank green tea with ones who didn't found that the green tea drinkers tended to live a few years longer.
Hopefully, over the next few decades, there will be more interest in investigating the health benefits of green tea, and we will finally get our answer. The state of the research overall is inconclusive, as few drug companies are interested in funding studies into something that is seen as ‘alternative' medicine, the testing is left to interested but under-funded universities. However, the unfortunate counterpoint to all this is that very large quantities of green tea have actually been found to cause cancer in lab rats, suggesting that too much green tea can be worse for you than none at all - perhaps a similar effect to the one red wine has.