The properties of green tea and its countless benefits

Scientific articles

THE COUNTLESS PROPERTIES OF GREEN TEA

Green Tea is a beverage with millennia of use valued especially as a stimulant and tonic against fatigue, stress, and excessive fatigue.

Green Tea herbal tea is also an excellent thirst-quenching drink with diuretic properties, used as an adjuvant in low-calorie diets to lose weight. Consumed routinely, Green Tea can protect against the damaging action of free radicals (ROS), slow down the cellular aging process, and preserve cognitive function.

The properties of Green Tea are mostly antioxidant and anti-inflammatory, and it can also help protect blood vessels, reduce cholesterol levels, and help prevent the risks of cardiovascular disease. Another interesting property attributed to Green Tea is slimming. Green Tea infusions are often used as weight loss aids because of Tea’s stimulating action on basal metabolism and because of this remedy’s ability to promote glycogen mobilization, fat oxidation, and increase lipolysis.

Like all types of Tea, Green Tea comes from the Camellia Sinensis plant native to China and is obtained by subjecting the Tea leaves to a thermal process called stabilization . This can be done with dry heat (roasting) or moist heat (steaming). The dry extract is rich in polyphenols and antioxidants. This process inhibits the enzymes responsible for oxidation, thus allowing the leaves to retain their characteristic green color.Oxidation is a chemical reaction that occurs spontaneously in Tea leaves, darkening their color.

Green Tea is also referred to as unfermented, as it does not undergo fermentation. Specifically, Green Tea contains very high amounts of polyphenols, substances with a beneficial and antioxidant role for the human body. In particular, the most characteristic polyphenol and the main one responsible for the properties of Green Tea isEpigallocatechin-3-gallate. Also known by the acronym EGCG, it is present in amounts about 10 times higher than Black Tea and 2.5 times higher than Oolong Tea.

Green tea and health benefits

The human health benefits that can be derived from the consumption of Green Tea are indeed many. This beverage has already been and still is the subject of several studies, the goal of which is to learn more and more about its possible curative role. In particular, Green Tea is said to have anti-cancer properties: antioxidant, neuroprotective, and energizing. Green Tea gives multiple health benefits, protects cells from mutations and inhibits the growth of cancerous cells being rich in flavonoids and polyphenols.

It provides benefits to the cardiovascular system: it regulates the hemostatic balance and thus coagulation, acts on the physiological control of cholesterol, slows the development of atherosclerosis, and thus may have an important role in reducing the potential risk of coronary artery disease. This is all thanks to CATECHINS, i.e., the antioxidant substances found in Green Tea, which create a protective effect as they help lower blood pressure and improve blood circulation.

The result is valuable protection against hypertension, atherosclerosis, thrombosis, myocardial infarction, and stroke. It would also appear to have a neuroprotective effect: thanks to the combined action of the polyphenolic derivatives (flavonoids, chlorogenic acid, caffeic acid and tannins) it contains and may play a role of some importance in the prevention and treatment of neurodegenerative diseases. Finally, it is a natural energizer: it has always been drunk for its stimulating and energizing properties.

Slimming down: green tea speeds up metabolism

Green Tea accelerates fat and sugar metabolism, thus facilitating the decrease of body weight. It also stimulates diuresis and is therefore useful in cases of water retention, cellulite and urinary tract infections. And these are just a few among the countless properties of green tea.

Within a path consisting of a healthy, low-calorie diet and regular physical activity, including Green Tea every day is a valuable aid to weight loss. The drink is, in fact, rich in catechins, antioxidant substances belonging to the flavonoid family, which can give a prolonged sense of satiety that decreases the risks of eating more than necessary and resorting to snacking to buffer the sense of hunger.

They also accelerate basal metabolic rate and stimulate the process of thermogenesis, a process that reduces the conversion of dietary fat intake into calories by directing nutrients (especially carbohydrates and fats) to produce energy in the form of heat, rather than to synthesize reserve adipose tissue.Acting on thermogenesis, therefore, allows us to keep body weight more under control and prevent fat accumulation, especially in the waist and abdominal area.

Green Tea helps to lose weight because it contains methylxanthines(caffeine, theobromine, theophylline), molecules that reduce the absorption of sugars, stimulate lipolysis, i.e., the elimination of fat from adipocytes (also made possible by the positive effect performed on cortisol, an important lipogenetic hormone) and, due to its vasodilatory action, result in increased kidney activity and more effective diuresis.

Producing and eliminating more urine facilitates the purification of the body, as the waste and toxins that accumulate in it are removed and excess fluids are eliminated, which, when stagnant, give rise to the annoying and unsightly cellulite. In fact, the accumulation of waste and toxins prevents the body from working at its best and the cells from being able to assimilate good substances at the expense of fats: this is why it is important to stimulate their excretion.

Undesirable effects

It is good to remember that, although natural, given the properties of green tea this drink can cause some undesirable effects in some people mainly because it is rich in caffeine. Consuming up to 3 cups a day does not lead to harmful or detrimental effects on health. The fact remains that in predisposed people or if consumed in excess it can give problems to those suffering from insomnia, palpitations, arrhythmias, high blood pressure, anxiety and nervousness.

Although the caffeine and theine contents are lower than those found in coffee, it is therefore good not to overdo the use of Green Tea to avoid phenomena such as insomnia, irritability, and tachycardia. For this very reason, in pregnancy and lactation it is a good idea to take it in moderation. The tannins in the drink can increase the amount of acid produced in the stomach, so people with acid reflux or peptic ulcer disease should reduce their daily intake. Tannins also reduce the amount of absorbable iron: given the properties of green tea, anemic people would do well to drink it away from meals. Finally, concomitant use with some medications (such as, for example, antiplatelet agents, insulin, MAOs) may cause a moderate interaction toward them.