Your Genes and Your Nutrition

Epigenetics is a relatively new field that studies how your diet, hormones and environmental toxins effects your gene expression. It is the concept of nature versus nurture, and both play a huge factor! Your DNA is constantly changing as your genes get turns on and off by environmental factors in an effort to adapt to that environment. Generally, when people are healthy, their genetic code is successfully adapting to their surroundings. Problems arise when the DNA does not effectively adapt to the environment, making your surroundings more than your genes can handle.

Nutrition has become a very popular topic in the epigenetics world. When we eat something, it is broken down into different components, some of which can turn our genes on and off. For example, some foods turn off cancer growing genes while others turn off tumor fighting genes. A component of green tea, EGCG, helps activate cancer fighting genes while blocking DNA damage from oxidation! With this knowledge, we can alter diets to prevent diseases and other health problems. 

While you can't change your DNA, you can live a healthy life in order to show the best gene expression possible.