IMPACT OF NUTRACEUTICALS ON HEALTH AND DISEASE PREVENTION: A COMPREHENSIVE REVIEW

Abstract

Nutraceutical is a hybrid of 'nutrition' and 'Pharmaceutical' . Nutraceuticals in broad are food or part of food playing a significant role in modifying and maintaining normal physiological function that maintains healthy human beings. Nutraceuticals and functional foods in the recent years have witnessed a tremendous increase in the interest among the consumers due to their potential of providing health and medical benefits and regulating immunity and thereby preventing as well as treating simple diseases. Thus the sector of nutraceuticals is often envisioned together of the missing blocks within the health advantage of a private . The food products used as nutraceuticals can be classified as traditional and non-traditional . Traditional will be directly obtained from nature like lycopene in tomatoes, omega-3 fatty acids in salmon or saponins in soy etc. Whereas non-traditional are enriched with supplements or genetically modified designed crops to boost the nutrients like minerals added to cereals etc. These nutraceuticals help in combating some of the major health problems of the century such as obesity, cardiovascular diseases, cancer, osteoporosis, arthritis, diabetes, cholesterol etc. In whole nutraceuticals has led to the new era of drugs and health during which the food industry has become a search oriented sector. In present review, an understanding of various nutraceuticals and their role in preventing diseases, has been discussed. Further application of nutraceuticals within the prevention of varied diseases has also been discussed.