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The Br J Nutr. 2006 Nov;096(0S2) issue is on the health
benefits of nuts,
with an emphasis on tree nuts.

A suitable introduction may be:

Sabate J, Ros E, Salas-Salvado J. Links
Nuts: nutrition and health outcomes.
Br J Nutr. 2006 Nov;96 Suppl 2:S1-2. No abstract available.
PMID: 17125527

British Journal of Nutrition (0007-1145) Volume 096(0S2),
November 2006, pp
S1-S2
Preface
Nuts: nutrition and health outcomes
Joan Sabaté, Emilio Ros, Jordi Salas-Salvadó

In this supplement, we present a cluster of articles on nut
consumption, its
nutritional attributes and health outcomes. Extensive
research has been
carried out in this field during the last decade following
the seminal
publications by one of us relating nut consumption to lower
risk of heart
disease and improvement of serum lipid levels (Fraser et al.
1992; Sabaté et
al. 1993), and this volume attempts to summarise the current
knowledge on
the subject.

Nuts have constituted a part of mankind's diet since
pre-agricultural times
(Eaton & Konner, 1985). While the amount of nuts in the
human diet in the
distant past is unknown, consumption data from
industrialised nations
indicates a downward trend for most of the 20th century,
although nut
consumption in countries following a more Mediterranean diet
is twice that
of the American diet (Sabaté, 1993; Dreher et al. 1996).
Vegetarians and
other health-conscious populations, such as Seventh Day
Adventist, tend to
consume nuts more often than their counterparts (Sabaté,
1999). Whether for
custom, economy, apprehension or simple lack of knowledge,
large segments of
the world population do not consume nuts on a regular basis,
and for those
who do, nuts contribute a small proportion of their total
caloric intake.
Nuts are consumed either as snacks or part of a meal. Nuts
are eaten whole
(fresh or roasted), in spreads (peanut butter, almond paste)
or hidden (e.g.
commercial products, mixed dishes, sauces, baked goods, and
oils).

Nuts are nutrient dense foods. They contain high amounts of
protein and fat,
mostly unsaturated fatty acids. Nuts are also dense in a
variety of other
nutrients and provide dietary fibre, vitamins (e.g. folic
acid, niacin,
vitamin E, vitamin B6), minerals (e.g. copper, magnesium,
potassium, zinc)
and many bio-active constituents such as antioxidants,
phytosterols and
other phytochemicals (Dreher et al. 1996; USDA, 2006).
Botanically, tree
nuts are dry fruits with one seed in which the ovary wall
becomes hard at
maturity. The most popular edible tree nuts include almonds,
Brazil nuts,
cashews, hazelnuts, macadamias, pecans, pine nuts,
pistachios and walnuts.
Ground nuts, commonly known as peanuts, are actually legumes
but are
identified by consumers as part of the nuts food group.
Peanuts share a
similar nutrient profile with tree nuts. Although chestnuts
are botanically
tree nuts, they differ from other nuts because they are
starchy and have a
different micronutrient profile.

In the last 10 years, extensive research has been carried
out on the
potential health effects of nuts. Scores of human feeding
trials have
investigated the effect of nut consumption on blood lipids
and other
biological indexes of heart diseases (Kris-Etherton et al.
1999;
Mukuddem-Petersen et al. 2005). Epidemiological studies have
associated the
frequency of nut intake with reduced risk of some chronic
diseases, such as
coronary heart diseases (Hu & Stampfer, 1999; Sabaté et al.
2001), diabetes
(Jiang et al. 2002) and cancers of the prostate (Mills et
al. 1989; Jain et
al. 1999) and colorectum (Jenab et al. 2004; Yeh et al.
2006). Nuts are
complex food matrices containing diverse nutrients and other
chemical
constituents that may favourably influence human physiology,
a reason why
these benefits may reasonably be attributed to the whole
rather than the
parts.

Nuts are now considered an important component of a healthy
diet. Nuts are
fatty foods and presumably for this reason, until recently,
were ignored or
treated with a great deal of caution on most dietary
recommendations
(American Heart Association, 1991). Due to the increasingly
demonstrated
health benefits, nuts are currently considered fundamental
to several
dietary guidelines worldwide (Haddad et al. 1999; Johnson &
Kennedy, 2000;
Krauss et al. 2000; Canada, 2005; USDA, 2006; Salas-Salvadó
et al. 2001).
Nuts have been proposed as a component of optimal diets for
the prevention
of coronary heart disease by leading experts in the field
(Hu & Willett,
2002) and, in the summer of 2004, the Food and Drug
Administration of the
United States issued a health claim for nuts and
nut-containing products
because of the link of nut consumption with reduced risk of
heart disease
(USFDA, 2003).

We appreciate the contributions made by the authors of the
articles
presented in this supplement to the British Journal of
Nutrition and thank
the Nucis Foundation for sponsoring the publication of this
volume. We hope
that the information shared in this supplement will
stimulate interest and
new ideas for future research. Also, the contents of this
volume may be
useful in devising health policy strategies based on the
intake of this food
group.