(Rebecca Ochs/ European Scientist) — Scientists have discovered why coffee seems to be good for the heart and said that caffeine intake equivalent to drinking four cups of coffee a day could lead to improved heart health.
Although previous research has linked coffee to lower risks for various diseases, including type 2 diabetes, stroke and heart disease, scientists did not quite understand exactly how these health benefits occur.
Now, scientists in Germany have found that consuming a daily amount of caffeine equivalent to drinking four cups of coffee helps protect cardiovascular cells in mice and improves the cells’ ability to recover from damage.
The new study, conducted by Heinrich-Heine-University and the IUF-Leibniz Research Institute for Environmental Medicine, was published in the journal PLOS Biology last week.
In their experiment, the team focused on a protein called p27. They found that caffeine triggered the movement of p27 into mitochondria, the cell’s power generators, leading to a variety of beneficial changes in mice. (…)