Like most people, you can probably remember being a child and looking down at the unappealing sight of green vegetables sitting on your plate. You know what they taste like, and you know that you’d much rather having something sweet and tasty. But then your mother informs you that you have to eat your greens and that the matter isn’t up for debate.
Of course, learning that vegetables are good for us is one of the annoying parts of growing up. But now it seems that our parents were more right than they even knew. A new study from engineering researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute shows that the protein osteocalcin is actually a very important factor in bone strength. Osteocalcin appears to be strengthened by vitamin K, which is common in green vegetables like spinach and broccoli.
The study revealed that bone fractures begin from the creation of tiny holes, just 500 atoms wide, in the bone’s mineral structure. When we trip or fall, the force actually deforms protein joints in the bones. This, however, is just a natural defence mechanism to prevent any further damage to the surrounding area of the bone. But if the force is too great, or crucially, if the body is lacking in osteocalcin, the bone will crack and fracture.
Now that we know that osteocalcin is playing such an important role in whether bones fracture or not, further research can be done to find methods of strengthening the protein joints. This could have the potential to alter the way we think about making bones stronger and more able to resist being fractured.
While more research is necessary to confirm that the vitamin K contained in spinach and broccoli is actually having a measurable effect on osteocalcin, the results of this study do seem to suggest that these green vegetables are not only very healthy, but can help make our bones stronger too.
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