The more chocolate eaten, the better the protection. In these experiments, while all of the tested procyanidins appeared active, the pentamer offered the best protection. Nutritionist Carl L. Keen, Fraga's collaborator at UC Davis, has conducted additional Mars-funded work. At the AAAS meeting, he unveiled data from new studies indicating that flavonoid-rich foods may benefit the heart yet another way, by damping the reactivity of blood platelets. When stimulated by any of several chemical triggers, these cells turn sticky, helping blood to clot.
Doctors often recommend that people at risk of heart attacks take aspirins to reduce clotting.
Keen's data now show that chocolate's procyanidins work like especially mild aspirins. Seed pod sprouting off trunk of cacao tree. The researchers sampled and tested the volunteers' blood 2 and 6 hours later. Though both the wine and cocoa significantly delayed the blood's clotting time, only the cocoa protected blood platelets from fragmentation. Platelets tend to fragment when they become overly stickey, Keen says.