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The modest purple sweet potato: It’s the next major superfood and it will be coming your way soon.
We have seen it before with a number of different berries: the white cranberry, the pomegranate, and most recently with the Acai berry. Even beyond just the simple berries: a whole slew of fruits, vegetables and whatnots that all have been the subject of vigourous claims of being the latest and greatest ‘Super Food’. Anyway at this time a strain of purple sweet potato is being developed and tested as the latest super-food, and it already has scientists exclaiming that the vegetable may actually stop people from developing cancer. Seriously, that is quite aremarkable claim to hear made about any kind or type of produce, don’t you think?. The logic here is that the designer sweet potato, cultivated for its purple anti-cancer pigment, is also supposed to contain within it some anti-ageing and antioxidant chemicals. A crop-development expert in the United States has developed this new variety of purple sweet potato with a thicker purple skin and flesh to increase its inherent cancer-fighting properties. Soyoung Lim, a researcher from Kansas State University, claimed that it differed from purple sweet potato varieties currently found in most grocery retail outlets because both the newer potato’s flesh and skin were purple.
The chemical anthocyanin is believed to lower the risk of cancer and could even possibly be able to slow down the progression of certain forms of the disease, is contained in the purple potato’s coloring, according to Lim.. According to Lim, “The colour is the important part because the purple colour is responsible for the amount of anthocyanin in the potato.” Scientists have already used two strands of anthocyanin to treat colon cancer and found that the pigment slowed down the growth of cancerous cells. Anthocyanin, which produces red, blue or purple colours in different types of food, can also be found in blueberries, red grapes and red cabbage, though the specially grown purple sweet potato has a higher concentration of the chemical than any other species of potato. Dr Weiqun Wang, who was also involved in testing the potato, has said that the new purple sweet potato tasted sweeter than other potatoes but was still perfectly edible. According to Wang, “It’s good not only for cancer prevention but other benefits like antioxidants as well.”
The high-concentration purple sweet potato is due for a series of clinical trials next year, so it might actually be a while before it is made available for retail to the general public. Naturally like I mentioned previously, there have been so many other types of produce that have been the focus of claims as to their possible health benefits, yet I do not recall before any variety of food that was tagged with such a basic claim that carried with it such potentially major implications for human health and wellbeing. As the new purple sweet potato is put through its paces, so to speak, through the next year or so, I look forward to hearing just how impressive the clinical trial results are…