The review, which was conducted by a team of researchers associated with institutions in India and China, takes a pharmacological approach to looking at the effects of curcuminoids in this regard. The research was published in the journal Molecules.
Common lifestyle condition
Atherosclerosis, or ‘hardening of the arteries’ in common parlance, is a multifaceted process by which arteries lose their elasticity and/or become lined with plaques consisting mostly of cholesterol and calcium. The inelastic arterial walls can have negative effects on blood pressure, and the plaques eventually constrict blood flow, sometimes with fatal consequences.
Atherosclerosis has become one of the most common ‘lifestyle’ diseases in the United States and worldwide. A recent study in the Journal of Clinical Lipidology had this to say: “Approximately 15% of the US adult population has either ASCVD (atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease) or diabetes with ∼7% being either recent ACS or stable CHD, and ∼6% having diabetes without ASCVD.”
Curcuminoids exhibit complex mechanisms of action
In addition to the antioxidant and anti inflammatory properties of curcuminoids, the review authors noted that evidence is growing of the molecules’ ability to beneficially alter cellular signaling mechanisms.
“There is growing evidence that curcumin can regulate different signaling molecules to retard the progression and development of atherosclerosis,” they wrote. This assertion was supported by reference to a 2018 Chinese study done on mice.
The authors noted that many complex mechanisms have been identified for curcumin’s effects in the circulatory system. Among these are effects on macrophages, the upregulation of proteins such as thrombospondin-4, and the modulation of the production of other proteins such as chemoattractant protein-1.