How Not to Age: The Scientific Approach to Getting Healthier as You Get Older

by Michael Greger

We can just let the plants get stressed because, incredibly, the stress response molecules in plants may activate the same protective responses in us.7011 The majority of known health benefits of edible plants may be attributable to the pharmacologically active substances of plants’ sophisticated stress responses, off which we can then piggyback. For example, I’ve often mentioned polyphenols, a class of phytonutrients for which there’s a huge medical literature on health-promoting effects.7012 Plants produce polyphenols to protect themselves,7013 and we may be able to expropriate and commandeer them for our own similar purpose.7014 Xenohormesis explains how environmentally stressed plants produce bioactive compounds that can confer survival benefits to those of us who consume them. Drought-stressed strawberries, for example, have more antioxidants and other phytonutrients. Have you ever eaten a wild strawberry? The taste is incomparable to the flat flavor facade of the cultivated kind. The healthiest grapes often grow in relatively dry, sun-exposed, infertile soil.7015 Studies show that commonly consumed fruits and vegetables can be nutritionally enhanced by light, water, nutrient deficits, cold stress, or being nibbled on by bugs.7016 That may help explain why the levels of phytonutrients are estimated to be 10 to 50 percent higher in organic vegetables compared with conventionally grown ones.