Browse evidence-based analysis of health-related claims and assertions
There was a hint that the drug might help turn some immune cells into a less inflammatory type, but the data weren’t strong enough to be sure.
Quantitative
More of two specific saturated fats — palmitate and palmitoleate — in fat tissue is linked to more inflammation-causing immune cells in the belly.
Correlational
The drug didn’t make the fibrous cap around the plaque thicker, so its protective effect must come from other changes, like less cell death or inflammation.
Eating more omega-3 fats — like those in fish and certain oils — is linked to fewer inflammation-causing cells in belly fat.
The drug didn’t lower the mice’s overall cholesterol, so its benefits must come from something else—like reducing inflammation or cell death in plaques.
People with higher bad cholesterol tend to have more inflammation-causing immune cells in their belly fat — for every 1 mmol/L rise in cholesterol, these cells go up by about 18%.
The drug seemed to make more of the CD36 protein visible in the artery plaques, which might help the body clear dead cells better.
When people in the Czech Republic stopped eating so much butter and started using healthier oils, their bad cholesterol levels dropped by 14%.
The drug lowered two key inflammation signals in the blood by nearly half, which may help calm down the body’s harmful immune response in the arteries.
The drug lowered the levels of two proteins in the arteries that are known to break down plaque structure, which might help keep plaques from bursting.
The drug-treated mice had almost half as many dying cells in their artery plaques, which could mean their plaques are less damaged and more stable.
Mice treated with the drug had much smaller dead-cell areas in their artery plaques—almost half as big—which might mean their plaques are less likely to break open.
Giving a special peptide drug daily to mice with clogged arteries helped reduce the size of the blockages by about one-third, compared to mice that didn’t get the drug.
When immune cells from mice eating olive oil and nuts were provoked in a lab, they released less of the inflammatory chemicals than cells from mice eating butter.
Mechanistic
Even though mice eating olive oil and nuts had fewer artery plaques, their blood showed more signs of oxidative damage, which is a surprising and complex finding.
Descriptive
The livers of mice eating olive oil and nuts turned off genes that make fat, compared to mice eating a fatty diet, which may help explain why they had less fat in their blood.
Mice eating olive oil and nuts had more of the good fats (like olive oil and nuts) and less of the bad fats (like butter) in their blood than mice eating a typical fatty diet.
The plaques in mice eating olive oil and nuts had fewer inflammatory immune cells inside them than plaques in mice eating a fatty diet.
Immune cells from mice eating olive oil and nuts stuck less to the inside of blood vessels in a lab test, meaning they were less likely to start building artery plaques.
When immune cells from mice eating olive oil and nuts were tested in a dish, they absorbed less of the bad cholesterol that clogs arteries than cells from mice eating butter.
The immune cells in mice eating olive oil and nuts had fewer 'danger signals' on their surface than those eating a fatty Western diet, making them less likely to trigger inflammation.
Mice eating olive oil and nuts had fewer fat-filled immune cells in their blood than mice eating butter, which may help prevent artery damage.
Mice that ate olive oil and nuts instead of butter had less cholesterol and fat in their blood, which might help keep their arteries from getting clogged.
When mice with a genetic predisposition to clogged arteries ate a diet with olive oil and nuts instead of butter and animal fat, their artery plaques got smaller.