Replies to post #202547 on Biotech Values

[biotech_researcher]

biomaven0, your post could undoubtedly be included in the list of posts of the year:

"I view the pomegranate as the fruit equivalent of those biotech companies that are basically science experiments masquerading as for-profit companies.

There are well over 1,000 PubMed articles relating to pomegranates.

Pomegranates contain maybe 50 different families of phytochemical compounds, some of which are largely specific to that fruit. Each of those compounds typically has a bunch of chemical variants relating to added sugar chains and the like. Each variant has unique absorption and PK and interacts differently with different gut microbiota which metabolize them in different ways. Different varieties and growing conditions produce a different collection of compounds. The seeds, the juice, the pulp and the skin all have different properties.
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So bottom line is that it's pretty close to impossible to study the effects of ingesting pomegranate properly. Just too many variables and not enough money. ****But pomegranates are indeed a great source of mostly useless publications.***"

Just a terrific fruit to propagate all the nuances of science... Peach pits are another....

[biomaven0]

Just to add a couple of supporting details.

From the urolithin paper:

Notably, it has been observed that intestinal biotransformation of EA into urolithins is heterogeneous across individuals, with individuals showing high or low conversion rates, as well as those who do not convert at all

And picking a random phytochemical in pomegranates:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedunculagin

Note that it is indeed biologically active - indeed it is a "highly active" carbonic anhydrase inhibitor.

Basically you can pick some random cell model (like a cancer cell line) and some random pomegranate compound and have a reasonable expectation of getting some kind of publishable result. But I highly doubt that translates to what happens when you eat pomegranates.