Special Issue "Healthy Benefits of Nutraceutical, Phytochemicals in Agricultural Products"

Guest Editor
Prof. Dr. David D. Kitts
Faculty of Land and Food Systems, Food, Nutrition and Health, FNH 243 - 2205 East Mall, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6T 1Z4
Website: http://www.landfood.ubc.ca/directory/faculty/professors-and-instructors/david-kitts
E-Mail: david.kitts@ubc.ca
Phone: +1 604 822 1219
Fax: +1 604 822 6394
Interests: food chemistry; functional foods; bioactive food components; lipids; antioxidants; health

Guest Editor
Prof. Dr. Sherry A. Tanumihardjo
Nutritional Sciences Building, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1415 Linden Drive, Madison, WI 53706, USA
Website: http://www.nutrisci.wisc.edu/FACULTYPAGES/f_tanumihardjo.html
E-Mail: sherry@nutrisci.wisc.edu
Phone: +1 608 265 0792
Fax: +1 608 262 5860
Interests: anthocyanins; carotenoids; nutrition; phytochemicals; staple crops; vegetables

Dear Colleagues,

Functional foods and beverages, along with dietary supplements have received excellent growth in market share for North American, Asia Pacific and European food and natural health product companies. This success can be attributed mostly to the enhanced recognition by consumers on the importance of a healthy diet and the search for value-added food products which can offer potential health benefits.  In addition to the increased awareness on the link between human health and diet, other trend drivers influencing growth of the function food industry include aging consumer populations; government recognized pressures to reduce healthcare costs, scientific improvements on evaluating safety and efficacy of newly formulated products, and finally increased interest by manufactures to establish distinct differentiation in their products.

The role of Agriculture in meeting the challenges of identifying and securing globalization of functional ingredients for healthy human diets has evolved from the traditional production of raw food products and food processing.  The modernization of methods used to recover high quality food ingredients from traditional crop sources, combined with advances in novel food engineering technologies that ensure purity, functionality and thus efficacy for use in food formulations, underpin the activities required for new functional food products to establish regulatory approval and introduction of product-specific health claims.

This issue will bring together the interface between Agriculture and Human Health as it relates to the standards of evidence presently available for employing bioactive ingredients derived from stable agricultural crops, for use in functional food product development and enhanced human nutrition for today’s consumer.

Prof. Dr. David D. Kitts
Prof. Dr. Sherry A. Tanumihardjo
Guest Editors

Submission

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. Papers will be published continuously (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are refereed through a peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Agriculture is an international peer-reviewed Open Access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. For the first couple of issues the Article Processing Charge (APC) will be waived for well-prepared manuscripts. English correction and/or formatting fees of 250 CHF (Swiss Francs) will be charged in certain cases for those articles accepted for publication that require extensive additional formatting and/or English corrections.

• bioactive phytochemicals
• healthy benefits
• obesity
• metabolic syndrome
• antioxidant
• antiinflammatory
• anticancer
• botanicals
• nutrition

Type of Paper: Review
Title: The Potential Role of Anthocyanins in Human Health
Author: Shawn Somerset
Affiliation: School of Allied and Public Health; Australian Catholic University; Brisbane, Australia
Abstract: Anthocyanins belong to the most common class of phenolic compounds, flavonoids and occur ubiquitously in plants, conferring the bright red, blue and purple colours of fruits and vegetables. Major sources of anthocyanins comprise blueberries, cherries, raspberries, strawberries, blackcurrants, purple grapes and red wine. Anthocyanins demonstrate a number of biological attributes linked to anti-carcinogenic, cardioprotective, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, neuroprotective effects, and visual health, especially related to diabetes. This review highlights the major potential health effects of anthocyanin intake and prospective ways in which to utilize the dietary constituents to their full potential. The bioavailability, metabolism, metabolic pathway saturation, and chemical stability have been identified as key issues to move towards their use in preventive or therapeutic contacts.