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New research suggests that there could be health hazards associated with consuming excessive amounts of beta-carotene .

This antioxidant is a naturally occurring pigment that gives color to foods such as carrots, sweet potatoes and certain greens. It also converts to vitamin A, and foods and supplements are the only sources for this essential nutrient.

But scientists at Ohio State University have found that certain molecules that derive from beta-carotene have an opposite effect in the body: They actually block some actions of vitamin A, which is critical to human vision, bone and skin health, metabolism and immune function.

Because these molecules derive from beta-carotene, researchers predict that a large amount of this antioxidant is accompanied by a larger amount of these anti-vitamin-A molecules, as well.

Vitamin A provides its health benefits by activating hundreds of genes. This means that if compounds contained in a typical source of the vitamin are actually lowering its activity instead of promoting its benefits, too much beta-carotene could paradoxically result in too little vitamin A.

The findings also might explain why, in a decades-old clinical trial, more people who were heavily supplemented with beta-carotene ended up with lung cancer than did research participants who took no beta-carotene at all. The trial was ended early because of that unexpected outcome.

The scientists arent recommending against eating foods high in beta-carotene, and they are continuing their studies to determine what environmental and biological conditions are most likely to lead to these molecules production.

We determined that these compounds are in foods, theyre present under normal circumstances, and theyre pretty routinely found in blood in humans, and therefore they may represent a dark side of beta-carotene, said Earl Harrison, Deans Distinguished Professor of Human Nutrition at Ohio State and lead author of the study. These materials definitely have anti-vitamin-A properties, and they could basically disrupt or at least affect the whole body metabolism and action of vitamin A. But we have to study them further to know for sure.

The study is scheduled for publication in the May 4, 2012, issue of the Journal of Biological Chemistry.

Previous research has already established that when beta-carotene is metabolized, it is broken in half by an enzyme, which produces two vitamin A molecules.

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Potential Dark Side To Diets High In Beta-Carotene

Weve all become familiar with Somaya Reece, an aspiring artist & model, during the last two seasons of Love & Hip Hop . From her outspoken personality to her by any means necessary approach to her music career, Somaya quickly became a regular topic of conversation. At 510, and often dressed in unconventional clothing, it was hard to miss the Los Angeles native, however, after signing with a new agency, and doing some personal evaluation, Somaya decided it was time to make a change.

Last Fall, she quietly began undergoing a make-under. She toned down her style, changed her eating habits and then made headlines when she announced that shed be undergoing a breast reduction. The results, revealed last week on her Instagram, were more than anyone could have ever imagined. Last week, Somaya spoke to us by phone from her LA home where shes still recovering to talk about what she calls the best decision shes ever made, and shared her diet plan for those who are interested in losing weight and getting fit.

Check out our interview below

When did you first start the weight loss plan? Id been trying to lose weight for a long time. I first started losing weight last Fall.

This was your first battle with your weight, right? Ive been dealing with weight issues for years. I used to be really super thin. When I first started modeling, I had a team of sharks around me, who didnt have my best interest in mind. I had an agency that told me I had drop a lot of weight.

So youve felt the outside pressures to be thin, for a while now? When I was on my MySpace, people didnt understand I was starving to be thin. I wasnt eating. At one point I was a size 0, and Im 510. I had a lot of really bad people advising me and I got sick. I collapsed on a set of a commercial. I was rushed to the hospital and treated for malnutrition and low iron. Finally the doctor told me, if I continued to not eat, I would die.

And thats when you started gaining weight. How did that make you feel? It made me angry, and finally I just said if no ones gonna love me as I am, then is this business really worth it. So I started eating normally and I got thick, which is how my body naturally is.

So cut to years later, and youre on Love & Hip Hop. Did you start to feel pressure to lose weight again? Its funny because I actually felt resistance to being thin. Now I had a team that kept telling me thick is in. And coming to New York was a big piece of it, being in LA its hard to stay in shape out here. Youre in a car all day. Working on the show, I was always doing stuff and the hustle is so fast paced, I was struggling to keep up. I had to switch up what I was doing.

Where did you start? With my diet. My schedule was so crazy that I wasnt eating, and then by the time I did eat, I would just grab anything. And finally I realized I wasnt getting enough calories to lose weight. So I had to start becoming super strict about what I was eating, and how often. I started setting a schedule, making sure I ate every three hours, which is harder than you might think.

And did you change what you were eating? Absolutely. I started eating clean. No fried foods, no junk food. Lots of vegetables, fruit, lean proteins. And I had to get a hold of portion sizes. I started drinking protein shakes, especially in the morning because Im not big on breakfast.

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Bitchie Exclusive: Somaya Reece Talks Diets & The Breast Reduction That Changed Her Life

The Volumetrics Eating Plan, a new weight-loss trend sweeping the nation, is winning people over with its "eat more" agenda.

Unlike diets that revolve around depriving their followers, the Volumetrics eating plan doesn't hold you back when craving a certain type of food.

Its creator, nutritionist Barbara Rolls, PhD, argues that limiting your diet too severely won't work in the long run. You'll just wind up hungry and unhappy and go back to your old ways, according to WebMD.

It's all a matter of calorie intake, says the doctor.

"By choosing foods that have fewer calories per bite, your portion size grows, but your overall calorie count decreases," Rolls, author of the new book "The Ultimate Volumetrics Diet," told CNN. "So you end up with a satisfying amount of food."

Rolls, a professor of nutritional sciences at the Pennsylvania State University, has spent the last 20 years studying the science of satiety -- that feeling of fullness at the end of a meal - and the affects that it has on hunger and obesity.

According to the Rolls's research, the amount of food that we take in has a greater effect on how full we feel than the number of calories in the food.

So when speaking in terms of the Volumetrics eating plan, the trick of it is to fill up on foods that aren't full of calories.

A guideline that makes the Volumetrics eating plan so popular with the general public is that that it doesn't ban food types, as many other diet plans do.

And while Rolls doesn't distinguish between "good food" and "bad food," she does urge people to evaluate foods based on their energy density -- a concept that is crucial to the diet, according to Jason Martuscello, a research specialist in Exercise Science and Nutrition at The University of Tampa.

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Volumetrics Eating Plan: Why This Dense-Food Diet Will Work For You [VIDEO]

By John Naish

PUBLISHED: 18:23 EST, 23 April 2012 | UPDATED: 19:03 EST, 23 April 2012

Yo-yo nightmares: However hard we may try, research increasingly suggests that diets actually encourage our bodies to make us fatter

Michelle Underwood knows only too well the agony of failed diets. The 36-year-old mother-of-three from Woking, Surrey, has seen her weight yo-yo from 11st to 19st repeatedly over the past decade, as a succession of diets initially worked, then failed spectacularly leaving her heavier and more desperate than ever.

Michelle blames herself for her serial dieting failures, saying she lacks willpower and has an appetite for the wrong food.

Last week saw a high-profile example of this common problem, when broadcaster Jenni Murray revealed in the Mail how she has piled back on the 5st she lost last year on the controversial Dukan diet.

She had dropped from 19st to 14st, with the intention of losing another two. But all the hard work came undone in a matter of five weeks on an extended holiday, she said, followed by a diet-free Christmas.

Murray has now joined WeightWatchers and believes she has finally found a diet that works for her.

One must admire her optimism and wish her luck. But scientific evidence increasingly points to a far deeper problem that confronts dieters: cutting out calories changes your metabolism and brain, so your body hoards fat and your mind magnifies food cravings into an obsession.

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Research shows trying to lose weight alters your brain and hormones so you're doomed to pile it on again

MISSION, KS--(Marketwire -04/19/12)- (Family Features) According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), in the past 20 years, the diets of most Americans have changed, consuming too many calories and too few nutrients. This type of diet leads to weight gain -- 60 percent of Americans are overweight or obese -- and 9 out of 10 Americans fall short of many essential nutrients in their diets. With on-the-go lifestyles, many people find it difficult to eat right, exercise regularly and keep their diet in check.

Dr. Melina Jampolis, author of "The Calendar Diet: A Month by Month Guide to Losing Weight While Living Your Life," knows that even small, consistent steps can lead to big changes over time. "Eating a well balanced diet, keeping to a fitness routine and maintaining one's weight are all tactics to support a healthy lifestyle. As a doctor specializing in nutrition and weight loss, I've been helping people navigate life's challenges using a motivational and simple, year-long approach." The "Calendar Diet," shows you how to maintain a healthy lifestyle month-by-month, allowing you to cut calories without depriving yourself.

Dr. Melina shares the following recommendations:

Eat wholesome foods"A menu filled with seasonal fruits and vegetables will give you a big nutritional boost," suggests Dr. Melina. Vegetables, she explains, are packed with fiber and water, and are low in fat, so they decrease the calorie density of your diet, while boosting overall nutrition.

Opt for lean protein in your diet as well, which helps control hunger, stabilize blood sugar levels, support your metabolism, as well as build and protect muscle. Add moderate amounts of "good" fats -- found in nuts, seeds, avocados and olive oil -- to keep calories under control and support the absorption of fat soluble vitamins like A, D, E and K.

Supplement your diet"When you reduce calories, you reduce nutrient intake. I recommend dietary supplements to my patients who are restricting calories and who want to achieve optimal health," says Dr. Melina. "When choosing supplements, it is important to go with a reputable brand such as Nature Made," says Dr. Melina, "which has rigorous quality control standards in place to ensure what is on the label is in the bottle." Dr. Melina also recommends looking for products carrying the United States Pharmacopeia (USP) Verified Dietary Supplement mark, as a way to ensure the product has met stringent quality criteria for purity and potency. Nature Made was the first company to obtain the USP Verified Dietary Supplement mark for many of its products.

For most of her patients, especially those who are overweight or obese, live in northern latitudes, or are at an age greater than 65, Dr. Melina recommends taking a vitamin D supplement as this key nutrient plays a supporting role in bone, heart and immune health. "To determine if you have low vitamin D levels, speak with your doctor about having your blood levels of vitamin D checked," says Dr. Melina, who recommends adults take 1000 to 2000 International Units (IU) of Vitamin D3 daily to fulfill their vitamin D requirement.

Up your activityAlways speak with your doctor before beginning a new workout regimen. Make sure you get the recommended amount of activity into your week. "The key is to gradually increase your activity levels," says Dr. Melina. "By switching up your routine every month, you can continually challenge yourself, improve fitness levels and work major muscle groups in different ways to prevent plateaus."

For more information about vitamin D supplements, visit http://www.naturemade.com, and to order "The Calendar Diet," visit http://www.drmelina.com.

About Family Features Editorial SyndicateThis and other food and lifestyle content can be found at http://www.editors.familyfeatures.com. Family Features is a leading provider of free food and lifestyle content for use in print and online publications. Register with no obligation to access a variety of formatted and unformatted features, accompanying photos, and automatically updating Web content solutions.

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Realistic and Livable Tips for a Healthy Lifestyle

Sunday is Earth day, a reminder to continue striving to make environmentally responsible choices throughout our lives, including our diets.

Trying to incorporate more products that have been sustainably produced and packaged in recycled, recyclable and/or biodegradable containers can have a significant impact on our environment as well as our personal health and wellness.

But being eco-friendly doesnt mean you have to start grinding up egg shells and food scraps to fertilize your garden, and for some, even the idea of starting a garden, or riding a bike to work on a regular basis can seem unrealistic to maintain as daily routines.

So here are 10 simple strategies you can easily fit into a busy schedule and start implementing today to reduce, reuse, and recycle and improve your health.

1. Keep it local

Speak with any expert on eco-friendly living, and buying local tops every list.

The average food item on your plate has traveled 1,500 to 3,000 miles, requiring an enormous amount of energy and producing a significant amount of pollution, says Sean Miller, Education Director at Earth Day Network in Washington, D.C. Locally produced goods, in comparison, travel 150 to 300 miles on average, which is one of the key reasons that its so important to buy local.

There can be a nutritional benefit to buying local, as well. Farmers can let produce ripen more fully before harvest, and more time spent on the branch or vine means more time receiving nutrients from the soil.

Locally-grown produce hasnt been in transit for days, which means that its probably been exposed to less oxygen, light, and time, all of which can deplete produce of vitamins and phytochemicals.

Your options for buying local arent limited to just farmers markets. Local seafood, dairy, and produce is available in many local supermarkets.

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Earth Day fitness guide: 10 ways to save the planet and improve your health

For many people in the United States, French fries and breakfast cereal count as vegetables. And it shows with television programs like The Biggest Loser, healthy living programs in schools, and weight-loss challenges in the workplace, its evident that malnutrition is at epidemic proportions in this country.

But its not just obesity thats capturing attention; the fact is, most Americans are struggling just as much with undernourishment and nutritional deficiencies.

Agricultural producers and growers like to pride themselves on feeding the world, but what are they feeding? According to Philipp Simon, a geneticist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and a horticulture professor at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, 13 percent of the worlds population is undernourished, 30 percent are iron-deficient, and 2 percent have a vitamin A deficiency. And its not just third-world countries most Americans are chronically deficient in vitamins A and C as well as calcium, magnesium, and potassium. Consumers also struggle to get enough fiber, folate, and vitamin E in their diets.

These are all nutrients that can only come from the diet, and many come solely in the form of plants, such as vitamin C in orange juice. Encouraging consumers to eat more fruits and vegetables is one way to approach the problem; another way is to boost the nutritional content in the foods that people are eating. This has led to fortifying foods in some cases, as in bread and cereals, and to improving horticultural practices in other cases, such as adding selenium to the soil to increase selenium levels in garlic. Another strategy has been in breeding nutrition into plants.

Carotene and Carrots

Researchers have been successful in breeding nutrition into plants in many cases, such as increased protein into maize, iron into beans, zinc into rice and wheat, and vitamin A into maize, sweet potato, and some cucumber varieties. The bulk of Simons work has been with carrots, which contains the most vitamin A of any fruit or vegetable.

Even though, carrots have historically been one of the few crops to have increased its nutritional content the average carrot contained 60 parts per million (ppm) of vitamin A in the 1950s, to 90 ppm in the 1970s, to 130 ppm in the 1990s carrots continue to have potential, up to 300 ppm. So, theres a lot of opportunity for breeding nutrition into crops, Simon added.

An advantage to breeding vitamin A, also known as carotene, into carrots is that its easy for the consumer to choose the more nutritional carrot the deeper the orange color, the more vitamin A it has.

There are challenges, however, with getting the research out into the field. As with all crops, there is a pull between quality and quantity. Some varieties have more nutritional value than others. Some yield better. Some are more flavorful. Some are more convenient. Some have a longer shelf life.

Higher carotene content generally imparts no economic benefit to growers, Simon said. Future work will focus more on marrying qualities that growers are looking for, such as yield and shelf life, and what consumers want, such as flavor and convenience, with nutritional content.

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Target: A Healthy Harvest

I'm a food addict. We all are. Our brains are biologically driven to seek and devour high-calorie, fatty foods. The difference is that I have learned how to control those primitive parts of my brain. Anyone can this if they know how. In this article, I will share three steps to help you counteract those primitive parts of your brain that have you chasing high-calorie, nutrient-poor foods. But before you can update your brain's biological software, you've got to understand why it developed in the first place.

Calories = Survival

The brain's desire to binge on rich food is a genetic holdover from the days of hunter-gatherers. Given what scientists know today about our early ancestors it makes sense that our brains are hardwired to fixate on high-calorie foods. It's a survival mechanism. Eating as many calories as possible, whenever possible, allowed our ancestors to store excess calories as fat and survive lean times. That approach worked well for 2.4 million years, but today it's making us sick and fat.

That's because our brains haven't evolved as fast as our food environment. The human brain evolved over 2.5 million years. And, with the exception of the last 10,000 years, people only ate animals they could hunt and wild plants they could gather. Imagine if you could only eat what you caught or picked! The variety of foods hunter-gatherers ate paled in comparison to the 40,000 different food items we can buy in the average big-box grocery store today (1).

No cinnamon buns for them!

And whereas we have easy access to food 24/7, drive-thru meals were not an option for hunter-gatherers. Not to mention that hunting and gathering was hard work. Early humans expended lots of calories acquiring their food, so they needed to eat high-calorie foods to offset the loss. The average hunter-gatherer got up to 60 percent of his calories from animal foods, such as muscle meat, fat, and organ meat, and the other 40 percent from plants (2).

That balance between protein and carbohydrates in the diet is where the problem lies, but it's not what you think. Carbohydrates have gotten a bad rap, but they are the single most important nutrient for long-term health and weight loss. But I'm not talking about bagels and donuts. I'm talking about plant foods that more closely resemble what our ancestors ate. Hunter-gatherers ate fruit, tubers, seeds, and nuts. These are whole foods. They are full of fiber, vitamins, minerals and disease- and weight-busting colorful phytochemicals. They also take time to digest. Therefore, they raise blood sugar slowly, which balances metabolism and offers a steady stream of energy. Whole foods have all the right information and turn on all the right genes.

But the past 10,000 years saw the advent of both agriculture and industrialization. And, in the blink of an eye (by evolutionary standards), the human diet got turned upside down. Today, 60 percent of our calories come from things that hunter-gatherers wouldn't even recognize as food. The bulk of those items -- cereal grains, sugary drinks, refined oils and dressings -- are simple carbohydrates (3). The primitive brain sees an endless supply of easy energy. Left unchecked, our bodies pay the price. The result is a two-fronted epidemic of obesity and diabetes in our country -- what I call diabesity.

The Blood Sugar Cascade

When you eat simple carbohydrates, whether as sugar or as starch, they pass almost instantaneously from the gut into the bloodstream. Within seconds blood sugar levels start to rise. To counter the increase in sugar, the body releases insulin. Insulin is the key that unlocks the cells and allows sugar to enter. As sugar enters the cells, the amount of sugar in the blood declines and the body restores homeostasis.

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Mark Hyman, MD: How to Rewire Your Brain to End Food Cravings

A new study shows that junk food may have effects beyond expanding your waistline and upping your sodium levels -- it might also be sabotaging your mental health.

A new study in the journal Public Health Nutrition shows that regularly eating commercial baked goods -- including doughnuts and croissants -- as well as fast food -- pizza, hamburgers and hot dogs -- is linked with an increased depression risk.

Researchers from the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and the University of Granada found that the people who regularly eat these foods are also more likely to be more sedentary, smoke, eat other not-so-nutritious foods and work 45 or more hours a week.

"Although more studies are necessary, the intake of this type of food should be controlled because of its implications on both health (obesity, cardiovascular diseases) and mental well-being," study researcher Almudena Snchez-Villegas said in a statement.

The study included 8,964 people who didn't have depression (and weren't taking any antidepressant drugs) at the start of the study. Their depression statuses and diets were tracked for an average of six months.

At the end of the study period, 493 people were depressed or were taking antidepressants. The researchers found that the ones who ate the most junk food were 51 percent more likely to develop depression, compared with people who ate the least of these foods.

The Mayo Clinic reported on a previous study also showing a similar link. That study showed that people whose diets are high in fried foods, processed meats, desserts and high-fat dairy had an increased risk of depression symptoms, compared with people who eat lots of fruits, veggies and fish.

And earlier this year, a study in the journal PLoS ONE showed that there may be a link between eating trans fats -- common in a lot of junk foods -- and being irritable and aggressive.

The researchers of that study, from the University of California, San Diego, found that greater trans fats intake seemed to predict whether a person was more aggressive. The finding held true even after taking into account factors like sex, age and ethnicity.

Also on HuffPost:

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Junk Food Linked With Increased Depression Risk: Study

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It landed on the desk at Science-ish headquarters with a thud: the 482-page Carb Sensitivity Program by Natasha Turner, a naturopathic doctor who penned the bestseller, The Hormone Diet. The skeptic in Science-ish was aroused. And after an inner battle about whether the book deserved any inkeven of the digital sortits promises to help readers discover which carbs will curb your cravings, control your appetite and banish belly fat called out for a debunking.

Now, this isnt about picking on easy, pseudoscientific targets. The reason for the urgency is this: we too often hail new miracle diets without questioning the shaky (at best) evidence supporting them. Just look at the list of reputable news outlets that have already covered Turners work.If carbs truly were the enemy, Yoni Freedhoff, an evidence-based obesity-focused doc, rightly pointed out, When one in seven Americans was on the Atkins diet in the early 2000s, we would have seen the obesity epidemic go away.

But lets examine some of the claims Turner makes in the book. First, she begins with irresistible questions readers will no doubt identify with: Do you have a sweet tooth? Do you get sleepy or mental fogginess after meals? Do you feel bloated, especially after meals? Do you have a very large appetite or an obsession with food? According to Turner, this means youre probably carb sensitive. According to Science-ish, this means you are probably human.

Still, Turner has the answer. A carb rehab program that will repair your metabolism so you become symptom free and lose belly fat. For beginners, there is no evidence whatsoever to support the notion that targeted fat loss is possible. (Check out Tim Caulfields book The Cure for Everything!) So any time you see a magazine or book promising to help you bust the belly fat, chuck it. Its a bold-faced lie.

Turner also suggests a supplement regime to aid detoxification. The detox concept should sound alarm bells in any thinking persons mind. There is reams of evidence-based literature on why the notion of a detox is bunk. But this group of scientists did a good job of summing it up: Detox has no meaning outside of the clinical treatment for drug addiction or poisoning. People are not full of toxins that can be expunged from their systems by systematically eliminating one food groupthough its an appealing concept. The body can deal with the everyday chemicals it encounters and it certainly doesnt need the Clear Detox hormonal health packsupplements from Turners own wellness boutiquethat she prescribes in the book.

Unscrupulous peddling aside, people who follow the diet in the book may indeed lose weight. But, carb-sensitive or not, anyone who consumed what Turner is suggesting for a typical dayone fruit smoothie in the morning, a carb sensitivity shake as a snack, immunity-boosting Ginger Chicken for lunch, and cauliflower and kale soup with turkey breast for dinnerwould shed a few pounds.

Like the followers of many fad diets, Turners readers may attribute weight loss to her design. Just keep in mind what Caulfield told Science-ish: These fad diets cause you to pay attention to what youre eating for a specific amount of time, which forces you to concentrate on your food, and the result is weight loss. You attribute this weight loss to a magical return on your investment in the book. Its not. (You lost weight) because you paid attention to what youre eating.

Now, Science-ish has shown before that comparative studies have found that just about every diet works to the same degree when it comes to losing weight. (See this trial and this one for more good evidence of that.) If it were as simple as following a fad diet, like the one Turner is selling, wed all be thin. But, as this recent survey found, women have tried over 60 diets by the age of 45 in an effort to keep trim. Were still overweight.

This should not be depressing news, however. Its freeing. We can stop putting money on diet books and lining the pockets of deceitful peddlers of pseudoscience, and get on with life.

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‘Carb Sensitivity Program’: The dumbest diet book?

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