Summary: | 碩士 === 南華大學 === 自然醫學研究所 === 100 === Chinese TCM practitioners use dietary therapy to balance the body’s yin and yang, and to prevent diseases. The definitions of “warming" and "cooling” attributes of food do not refer merely to the food temperature, but also to its energetic properties. However, there is no scientific evidence to support this theory. The objective of this study was to establish a suitable scientific methodology to define the attributes of food ingredients by investigating the relationship between food attributes and heart rate variability (HRV) signals produced in healthy young subjects. White radish and ginger, which have cooling and warming attributes, respectively, were squeezed with water and filtered to make sample juices. Twenty college students were instructed to consume 250 grams of boiled water, raw white radish juice, cooked white radish juice, cooked white radish juice with ginger juice, and cooked ginger juice with water on five different visits. Paired t-test was used to analyze differences between the pre-test and post-test scores of each individual’s HRV. In addition, an ANOVA with repeated measurements was used to compare differences between the baselines of the five types of juices. The results show no significant changes in the HRV activities of subjects who drank boiled water and raw radish juice. On the other hand, results from the HRV analysis showed significant increases in the sympathetic and parasympathetic activities of subjects who drank cooked radish juice, cooked radish mixed with ginger juice and cooked ginger juice. Furthermore, statistical differences in HRV responses were found between subjects drinking cooked radish juice and raw radish juice. These differences were more obvious when they drank cooked radish juice mixed with cooked ginger juice. Our results indicated that TCM theories can be constructed through modern analysis, and the use of HRV is a promising method to classify attributes of food ingredients commonly used in Chinese dietary therapy.
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