Nutritional supplements help to maintain health of your body and
to protect your body from diseases. But to know what nutrition supplements
we need to take, we should have knowledge about nutrition and how
it works.
Understanding nutrition is very important for your health, because
if your body doesn’t get enough nutrition, it becomes weak and more
disposed to obtaining diseases. We need to understand it so that
we can take care of our bodies to help it to function well.
Nutrition is the study of nutrients and how it interacts with the
human body. It is a study on how the body uses food as energy for
its growth and activities. This leads to understanding how nutritional
supplements is useful for the body.
Macronutrients and the micronutrients are the two kinds of nutrients.
Macronutrients, also called the “big” nutrients, are made up of
proteins, carbohydrates and fats. Micronutrients, also called the
“little” nutrients, are vitamins and minerals. Both of these two
types of nutrients are what our body needs to be healthy.
Knowing about these two will give us a good understanding about
what nutritional supplements we need to help our bodies to function
well.
Macronutrients - Proteins
One of the major structural part of the body are proteins. The
organs and muscles consist of proteins. So is the blood, cell membrane
and immune system. The elements in proteins are called “amino acids”,
which is found mainly in meats, dairy products, eggs, soy, fish
and poultry.
Macronutrients - Carbohydrates
The main source of energy for the each cell in the body and fuel
for the body is carbohydrate. Carbohydrates is made up of carbon,
hydrogen and oxygen. Carbohydrates are sugar, starches and fibers
which are found in fruits, vegetables, grains, milk, syrups, honey
and table sugar.
Fats is necessary for our bodies to be in good health, but as noted
in the public eye, too much of it isn’t good for us. Fat provides
linoleic acid to our body. Linoleic acid is a fatty acid necessary
for our bodies growth, metabolism and healthy skin.
Fats, also, help absorb fat soluble vitamins.
The different types of fats are saturated fats, unsaturated fats,
trans fats. also called hydrogenated fats, and omega-3 fatty acids.
Saturated fats is found mostly in animal products like meat, dairy
and egg. Also, some are found in some plant based sources like coconut
oil.
Unsaturated fats are commonly liquid at room temperature. They
are found in most vegetable products and oils. Unsaturated fats
are found mainly in fish, nuts, seeds and oils from plants.
Trans fats are fats that are chemically processed that changes
liquid oil into solid fats. It’s formed during the process of hydrogenation.
Omega-3 fatty acids are called essential fatty acids and are important
for our health but can’t be produced by our body. For this reason,
omega-3 fatty acids must be obtained from food. Omega-3 fatty acids
are found in fish and certain plant oils.
Micronutrients - Vitamins
Vitamins are organic molecules that are vital in every living organism.
Vitamins are classified as water soluble and fat soluble. Water
soluble vitamins are vitamins that are easily dissolved in water
while fat soluble vitamins are vitamins that are absorbed through
the intestinal tract with the aid of lipids. Vitamins are important
for normal growth and development and in various chemical reactions
in the body. There are different types of vitamins. Each has its
own function in our body that is why vitamins are essential in the
body’s nutrition.
Micronutrients - Minerals
Minerals are inorganic elements, “non living” elements, that are
relevant nutrition for humans, animals and plants. The human body
contains lots of minerals. They are the main structural part of
the body. Just like vitamins, minerals have significant function
in the human body.
I would like to mention that too much or too little of these nutrients
are not a good thing for our health, but adequate amounts are necessary
for our health.
In future articles, we will get more detailed about the nutrients
to get a further understanding of how it effects our bodies and
to give us better understanding of how nutritional supplements will
help our bodies for health.
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