Year: 2021
Type: article
Abstract: Among all the plant species examined, together with the food products that derive from it, coffee \nhas a reputation that over the course of history has had a rather controversial evolution: some \nepisodes are emblematic of the mistrust that, in the first decades of its diffusion in Europe and in the \nWorld, accompanied the drink. Coffee is obtained by infusing the powder obtained by grinding the \ntoasted seeds of some species of tropical shrubs belonging to the genus Coffea, practiced through \nvarious techniques; although there are over 100 species, those used for food consumption are very \nfew, and almost all of the market is aimed at only two of them: Coffea arabica and Coffea canephora, \nbetter known commercially (but improperly) with the name of Robusta. Today it can be said that the \nantioxidant activity of coffee, intended both as a vegetable and as a drink, has been known for some \ntime and has been evaluated through different methods; various studies have shown that the high \ncontent of polyphenols in coffee plays an important role in its strong antioxidant action. Since 1997, the \nyear in which the first works on this activity were presented, the concern about the potential risks \nrelated to coffee intake has rapidly diminished and a line of research has originated aimed at evaluating \nits therapeutic effects, especially chemopreventive, antidiabetic and anticarginogenic effects. \nIt was immediately proposed that, at the head of the wide family of active polyphenolic compounds, \nthere were chlorogenic acids, whose remarkable ability to prevent oxidative cell damage was \nimmediately determined.
Language: English
Topic: Coffee research and impacts
Subfield: Pharmacology (medical)
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W3209523716