Sunflower Seed Oil Edible Effects and Nutritional Value

What is Sunflower Seed Oil?

Sunflower seeds are the fruit of the sunflower. Its kernels contain 30%-45% fat, up to 60%. Sunflower oil is golden in color, clear and transparent, and has a fragrant smell. It is an important edible oil. It contains a large amount of linoleic acid and other essential unsaturated fatty acids, which can promote the regeneration and growth of human cells, protect skin health, and reduce the accumulation of cholesterol in the blood. It is a high-grade nutritional oil.

Nutritionists have concluded that sunflower seeds are rich in iron, zinc, copper, potassium, magnesium and other trace elements, which are indispensable to the human body. Sunflower seed oil extracted from sunflower seeds contains more unsaturated fats, unsaturated fatty acids and linoleic acid. Eating sunflower seed oil can prevent heart disease and reduce cholesterol in human blood; sunflower seed oil contains Vitamin E is an efficient “antioxidant” that can enhance the function of the human immune system. It has the effect of preventing cancer, arteriosclerosis, cataracts and other diseases. Sunflower seeds, especially sunflower seed oil, have extraordinary health value to the human body. Foreign medical research has recently discovered that sunflower oil can also be used to treat a variety of diseases.

Main Components of Sunflower Oil

After analysis and identification, the main components of sunflower seed oil are 6% to 8% palmitic acid, 16% to 20% oleic acid, 2% to 3% stearic acid, and 73% to 85% linoleic acid. In addition, sunflower seed oil also contains natural VE, flavonoids and other active substances. Through comparative analysis, the quality of safflower seed oil in Xinjiang is as follows: the linoleic acid content can be as high as more than 83%, the natural VE content can be up to 160mg/100g, the flavonoid content can be up to 63mg/100g, and the α-linolenic acid content can be up to 0.23%. As a result, people have given sunflower oil the reputation of “King of Linoleic Acid” and “Crown of VE”.

Linoleic acid
Linoleic acid is an essential fatty acid for the human body. Since it cannot be synthesized by the human body, it must be supplied by the diet. According to a number of experimental studies including the National Ministry of Nutrition and Physiology of Japan and the National Institutes of Health of the United States, linoleic acid can effectively dissolve cholesterol and therefore has the effect of softening blood vessels, preventing and treating atherosclerosis, and regulating blood lipids. At this stage, linoleic acid and ethyl linoleate have been included in the national pharmaceutical product catalog as drugs. Nowadays, with the improvement of people’s living standards, the intake of nutrients such as meat products and egg products has gradually increased. The resulting high blood pressure, hyperlipidemia, and hyperglycemia have become common phenomena. Therefore, sunflower oil is the edible oil with the highest linoleic acid content. It is an excellent source of linoleic acid and has always been favored by consumers. Long-term consumption of sunflower oil with high linoleic acid content is of great significance for effectively preventing the “three highs”.
Flavonoids
Flavonoids are active substances with strong antioxidant properties. They can effectively remove free radicals in the body and delay aging. They improve blood circulation, reduce cholesterol levels in the body, regulate the fragility and permeability of capillaries, and expand coronary arteries. , increase coronary blood flow and protect the cardiovascular system. In addition, flavonoids also have good anti-tumor effects.
VE
VE, also known as tocopherol, is a fat-soluble vitamin and a natural antioxidant. It plays an important role in human cell division and delaying aging. Due to the strong effects and physiological activities of tocopherol, tocopherol has been extracted from natural VE in recent years. It is not only used in the medical field, but also used to prevent “modern diseases” caused by over-acidified lipids in the human body. It can also be used as food Additives, such as natural acidification inhibitors. The VE content in sunflower seed oil is not only high, but also has strong permeability. Therefore, the VE in sunflower seed oil is easily absorbed by the human body, effectively improving the utilization rate of VE.

Physiological Effects of Sunflower Seed Oil

Antioxidant effect of sunflower seed oil
Sunflower oil has good antioxidant effects. Sunflower seed oil has strong free radical scavenging and reducing abilities. In in vivo antioxidant tests, sunflower seed oil can significantly increase serum and liver SOD, GSH-Px, and GSH levels, reduce MDA and PC content, and have a negative impact on ethanol-induced It has a better protective effect against peroxidative damage in the body. In addition, although sunflower oil has good antioxidant capabilities, it should not be consumed in excess.
Anti-inflammatory effects of sunflower oil
Sunflower oil has anti-inflammatory properties. Medium and high doses of sunflower oil and hydrocortisone have good inhibitory effects on xylene-induced ear swelling in mice; low, medium and high doses of sunflower oil can significantly inhibit egg white-induced swelling of rat paws Swelling, especially in large doses, lasts the longest, up to more than 6 hours, and its effect is close to that of hydrocortisone.
Anti-aging effects of sunflower oil
The natural VE in sunflower seed oil has strong antioxidant properties. Regular supplementation of natural VE can make cells soft and elastic, enhance cell activity, keep skin soft and delicate, and thereby delay aging.
The cholesterol-lowering and blood-lipid-lowering effects of sunflower seed oil
High cholesterol is the main cause of cardiovascular disease, and elevated cholesterol can induce coronary artery disease. Sunflower oil emulsion has a significant effect on reducing serum lipids in animals. In addition, clinical studies have shown that if each person consumes 60g of sunflower seed oil per day, cholesterol will drop by more than 10% after 1 week, and blood lipids will remain stable after 3 months of consumption.
Sunflower oil can treat burns
Sunflower seed oil has protective and nutritional effects on the wounds of rabbits with deep second-degree burns, and can also promote the secretion of EGF factors in the blood of test rabbits.
Prevent Breast and Colon Cancer
Consuming moderate amounts of sunflower oil can help prevent breast and colon cancer.
Prevent atherosclerosis
Sunflower seed oil has the effect of regulating blood lipids, which is of great significance in preventing lipid metabolism disorders and thereby preventing the occurrence of atherosclerosis.
Prevent primary fatty acid deficiency
Sunflower oil emulsion protects against the biochemical symptoms of primary fatty acid deficiency.
Other functions
Sunflower oil has also been used for a long time to treat neuropsychological disorders, such as stroke. Sunflower oil has been found to effectively regulate dopamine and 5-hydroxytryptamine in the brains of newborn rats, and has analgesic and other effects. Sunflower seed oil has a good auxiliary therapeutic effect on patients with hyperlipidemia and high cholesterol; saffron seed oil has the effect of regulating blood lipids.

Applications of Safflower Seed Oil

Food industry
Safflower seed oil is a precious edible oil, known as “healthy oil” and “nutritional oil” because it contains more than 80% linoleic acid and is a high-linoleic acid vegetable oil. However, its active ingredients are too single. , excessive consumption will cause an imbalance of essential fatty acids in the body. Therefore, different proportions of essential fatty acids such as α-linolenic acid are added to safflower oil during production to form blended safflower edible oil and blended safflower health-care oil. The former is used as a health-care edible oil for middle-aged and elderly people, and the latter is used for heart health. Patients with cerebrovascular disease or hyperlipidemia can use edible oil for treatment. Adding this blended safflower oil to bulk edible oils can improve the structure of people’s edible oils, so that all ordinary people (including young people and children) can enjoy the benefits of blended oils.
Health products
Because the linoleic acid content of safflower seed oil is as high as over 83%, some health care product manufacturers purchase loose oil to process safflower seed oil soft capsule products. In addition, some beauty and cosmetic products purchase safflower oil for use in their products. , the natural VE in it can play an antioxidant and anti-aging effect.
Medicine
Long-term consumption of safflower seed oil can effectively prevent atherosclerosis, reduce blood lipids and serum cholesterol levels, soften blood vessels, and indirectly restore the nervous system and other medicinal functions. Therefore, in the pharmaceutical industry, safflower seed oil is often used as a raw material for blood cholesterol regulators, arteriosclerosis treatment and preventive agents, antioxidants and stabilizers of VA and VD.
Others
Safflower seed oil is used as a feed additive for dairy cows in the feed industry. It can prevent the saturation of fatty acids by rumen microorganisms and increase the linoleic acid content of milk fat. As an additive to alfalfa in sheep feed, it can avoid ruminant oxidation and supplement part of the Unsaturated fatty acids and nitrogen. As a high-quality drying oil, safflower seed oil’s good gloss retention and non-yellowing properties make it extremely popular in the spraying and printing ink industries of paints, varnishes, films, tapes, precision machinery parts. Safflower seed oil is also used to prepare alkyd resin, polyurethane resin, caulking glue and unsaturated linear fatty acid dimer (explosion-proof polyamide resin production raw material), etc. In agriculture, safflower seed oil can also be used to reduce freezing damage during fruit storage.