Did you know that 1 banana contains 467mg of potassium?!
Health Benefits of Bananas
Bananas contain all kinds of good things – health-promoting flavonoids and poly-phenolics, such as lutein, zeaxanthin, beta and alpha carotenes, acting as free radical-gobbling antioxidants. That’s also an advantage in the high vitamin C content, most known for its infection-fighting properties.
Just one banana contains 467 mg of potassium, which is important for controlling your heart rate and blood pressure. This is interesting, since the same amount of banana has just one milligram of sodium. The vitamin B6 (pyridoxine) in bananas provides around 28% of what is needed daily to help prevent anemia and coronary artery disease.
And that’s just part of it. Fiber in abundance helps keep your digestive system regulated. Magnesium helps strengthen your bones and protects your heart. Manganese is needed to activate antioxidant enzyme. One banana supplies an adequate amount of copper to keep up the production of red blood cells.
Note: You can freeze bananas, but if you refrigerate them, they’ll turn black.
Studies Done on Bananas
Research showed that among fruits and vegetables proven to be associated with cutting your risk of renal cell carcinoma, bananas were the highest.1 Another study showed that bananas, which are rich in vitamin A and carotenoids, have the potential to protect you against chronic diseases like diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and other types of cancer.
More positive proof of banana’s singular health benefits emerged in a study showing an important link between foods containing high levels of potassium, magnesium, calcium and fiber – like bananas, for instance – and a reduction in the risk of stroke in men.