Foods that Fight Wrinkles

Wrinkles may be an inevitable part of aging, but that doesn't mean fighting them is useless. Protecting your skin from exposure to ultraviolet radiation is the most significant thing you can do to prevent wrinkles, sagging, and discoloration. Some people try invasive techniques, such as chemical peels, Botox, dermal fillers, or surgery. But those efforts are all done from the outside. What about protecting your skin from the inside?

Researchers from Australia, Greece and Sweden, led by Martalena br Purba of Monash University, Melbourne, studied 450 people aged 70 or more to see if there was a link between how wrinkly they were and what they ate. They found that those who ate mainly vegetables, olive oil, fish, legumes, low-fat milk products and tea were the least wrinkled.

Based on the research findings, here’s a comprehensive list of what you should eat and drink to protect yourself against wrinkles:

• Green leafy vegetables
• Vegetables especially spinach, eggplant, asparagus, celery, onions, leeks, and garlic
• Vegetable juice
• Water and tea
• Legumes especially broad beans and lima beans
• Fruit especially cherries, grapes, melon, apple, prunes, pears, fruit salad, dried fruits
• Olive oil, and other monounsaturated fats including nuts and olives
• Polyunsaturated oil
• Yogurt
• Cheese
• Sardines
• Eggs
• Multigrain bread

The magic ingredients for protecting against wrinkles seem to be monounsaturated fat, vitamin C, retinol, calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, iron and zinc.

Vitamin C is a powerful antioxidant that helps to neutralize free radicals, the unstable oxygen molecules produced by pollution, stress and sun. Free radicals attack healthy skin cells and cause collagen breakdown, all of which lead to wrinkles. Antioxidants — found in green tea, vitamins C and E, and coenzyme Q10 — work together to neutralize free radicals.

Vitamin A is one of the fat-soluble vitamins and retinol is one of its most active forms. Retinol is required for growth and reproduction of the skin, and differentiation of epithelial tissue. This is important because your skin ages over time and the results are wrinkles, rough texture, discolorations, and thinning. Retinol is an essential fat-soluble vitamin that is used to combat these negative effects and promote healthy skin. This vitamin is found in animal foods such as liver and eggs and in some fortified food products.

Iron helps bring oxygen to the skin thus giving your skin enough air to breathe, while zinc promotes cell repair and growth, and is a key member of a group of enzymes that helps to maintain collagen supply. Without zinc, the enzymes that rebuild new collagen do not function properly.

The researchers concluded that people with the most wrinkles lunched on full-fat dairy foods, butter, margarine, red meat, soft drinks, cakes and pastries (Journal of the American College of Nutrition, vol 20, p 79).