Bio-Gen Extracts, who supported the study and supplied the TruBeet supplement, told NutraIngredients that the findings, published in Food and Function, are particularly relevant to sports nutrition and pre-workout formulations, where caffeine is widely used.
“They create opportunities to leverage clinically studied and standardised dietary nitrate ingredients such as TruBeet in formulations that consider cardiovascular responses alongside traditional performance outcomes,” Salman Mehkri, head of business development, commented.
Previous research suggests that dietary nitrates may be beneficial for cardiovascular function and health, particularly in individuals with hypertension, cardiovascular disease or related morbidities. Because these populations are often taking medications that modulate cardiovascular function and nitric oxide availability, it can be challenging for reserachers to determine the efficacy of dietary nitrates.
The study notes that one approach is to expose healthy individuals to a cardiovascular stressor. Acute caffeine can increase blood pressure and arterial stiffness and can be used as a model for cardiovascular strain.
Study author Dr. Stephen Bailey, reader in human and exercise physiology at Loughborough University told NutraIngredients that the findings were able to build o previous dose-response research which demonstrated that different cardiovascular outcomes respond differently to dietary nitrate, with improvements in arterial stiffness markers across the doses studied (200-800 mg) and endothelial function benefits at 400 mg.
“The current study extends this evidence by showing that dietary nitrate may also attenuate acute changes in arterial stiffness in response to caffeine, highlighting the importance of considering both nitrate dose and physiological context when exploring beetroot’s potential cardiovascular benefits,” he said.
Study details
The study involved 24 healthy participants who were randomly assigned to four experimental conditions in a crossover design.
The four conditions were: were nitrate -rich (400 mg NO3) and nitrate-depleted (92 mg NO3) beetroot powder consumed, with (BR-CAF and CAF) and without (BR and PL) 6 mg kg−1 caffeine. The participants attended each trial at the laboratory separated by a 48-hour washout.
The researchers measured blood pressure and arterial stiffness before and after supplementation, and assessed macrovascular endothelial function after supplementation using flow-mediated dilation.
“The main findings from this study were that acute caffeine consumption increased arterial stiffness in healthy adults,” Dr Bailey said. “Importantly, when caffeine was co-ingested with 400 mg of dietary nitrate from TruBeet, this increase was attenuated, with arterial stiffness measures no longer significantly different from placebo.”
“These observations support the notion that high-dose caffeine can strain the cardiovascular system with BR ingestion offsetting this effect,” the researchers wrote.
However, they noted that, given the observed mechanisms, they cannot extrapolate the findings to long-term high-dose caffeine consumption.
Mehkri told NI that BioGen want to build on their existing research: “We want to extend our studies to women and active older adults, particularly as active ageing gains momentum and women-specific evidence in active nutrition remains limited.”
Source: Food and Function 2026. doi: 10.1039/d6fo02338j; “Acute dietary nitrate supplementation attenuates caffeine-induced increase in arterial stiffness in healthy adults: a randomized cross-over trial.” Authors: A.G. McLellan et al.
