Soybean Seed Compounds as Natural Health Protectors

Abstract

Glycine max (L) Merrill, better known as soy or soybean, is a legume of asianorigin considered an excellent biotype, given the fact that it contains almost every-thing the human being needs for the diet. Its cultivation worldwide is one of themost important, and soy itself and its derivatives are highly on demand. The healtheffects of soy derived foods have been investigated for more than 25 years, and someof them remain controversial. On the other hand, we wondered if soy could be usedto ameliorate the toxic effects of heavy metals. Therefore, in this chapter we reviewgeneral characteristics of soy as well as its nutritional potential, and we compiledthe newest information about the health effects of soy. In order to test our hypoth-esis, we developed a model of animals exposed to cadmium, and we gave them a soybased diet, comparing it with a casein-based diet as control. This allowed us to col-lect information about its effect on the respiratory and nervous system. Among theresults of this review, we show that it reduces the cholesterol level and obesity whilealso having antidiabetic effects. We enumerate the benefits of soy-based diets on therespiratory system, such as protection against lung cancer and radiotherapy, betterlung function in asthma patients and protection against cadmium intoxication. Inthe cardiovascular system it reduces the risk of coronary heart disease, improvesblood pressure, glycemic control, and inflammation while it reduces not all butsome of the alterations induced by cadmium exposure on the aorta and heart. Itapparently promotes neurogenesis, improves cognitive functions, and reduces theoxidative stress and apoptosis induced by cadmium exposure in the cerebellum.Taken all together, this information let us conclude that soy consumption wouldexhibit numerous benefits for human health, although future studies should tryto elucidate the best outcome considering variables such as gender, age, treatmentduration and dosage of soy products consumption in the diet.