isoflavone

The soybean is a product that has long been important in industry and food production. Why, soybeans are everywhere! Apart from the traditional sources, such as tofu, tempeh, and soy milk, soybeans are also present in paint thinner, salad dressing, mayonaise, and a variety of other common products. It's so tasty, too!

Soybeans are used most often, however, as livestock feed. There's big money in it, too. It can be grown in most conditions, and is grown all over the world. Of course, the US has the highes soybean production rate. But then, this country is tremendous, and statistics mean nothing. Also, Americans are not among the chief soybean consumers (food-wise, anyway).

Recently, soybeans have been getting a lot of media attention. They have been cited as a miracle food, responsible for fighting heart disease, preventing cancer, and improving the sex lives of poultry (really!). However, it is possible that there are som detrimental effects of this wonder food. Soybeans have a compound in them that acts like estrogen, a female sex hormone. This compound, isoflavone, could be a wonderful estrogen supplement for menopausal and post-menopausal women. But possibly not for baby girls. Or baby boys, for that matter. Also, it is possible that it causes reproductive and liver damage to livestock (poultry in particular), and it could even be passed along to offspring of said livestock, where it could cause further damage. And it TRIES TO STEAL YOUR BRAIN. Well, maybe not that last part...

Fortunately for us (and the soybean industry) none of this has been proven outright just yet. Many, many researchers are working on evaluating these potential risks, as well as the potential benefits of soybeans. And their likliness of occurance.

For instance, even I, a lowly student, am participating in research that directly affects the progression of soybean research. One of the more important stages of isoflavone research is the quantification of isoflavones in soybeans. This way, researchers can tell if we ingest too much in the food we eat and feed to our animals. If it isn't, than we may not be putting ourselves at a big risk, and can all relax and be happy.

My research will help develop a method of quantification of soybean isoflavones, which will aid researchers IF they choose to read my paper and rely on my findings. Of course, they could take a whole year off and do the work themselves, discover that I was indeed right all along, and feel terribly guilty and buy me things to make up for it. Or not.