What is the health benefit of eating lychee?

​အောက်ဆုံးထိ ဆွဲကြည့်​​ပေးကြပါ ခင်ဗျာ

Lychee, litchi, and lichee all refer to the same tropical fruit that offers healthy vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. Adding this fruit into your diet is a healthy choice.

The lychee (Litchi chinensis) — also known as litchi or lichee — is a small tropical fruit from the soapberry family.

Other popular fruits in this family include rambutan and longan.

Lychees are grown in subtropical regions throughout the world and especially popular in their native China, as well as Southeast Asia.

Known for their sweet and flowery flavor, they’re typically eaten fresh and sometimes used in ice creams or processed into juice, wine, sherbert, and jelly.

They’re a good source of several vitamins, minerals, and healthy antioxidants.

Lychees have an inedible, pink-red, leathery skin, which is removed before consumption. The flesh is white and surrounds a dark seed in the center.

Nutrition Facts

Lychees are mainly composed of water and carbs — which make up 82% and 16.5% of the fruit, respectively.

A 3.5-ounce (100-gram) serving of fresh lychees provides the following nutrients. The table below shows the main nutrients in fresh lychees:

• Calories: 66
• Protein: 0.8 grams
• Carbs: 16.5 grams
• Sugar: 15.2 grams
• Fiber: 1.3 grams
• Fat: 0.4 grams

Carbs and Fibers

Besides water, lychees are mainly composed of carbs.

A single lychee — either fresh or dried — contains 1.5–1.7 grams of carbs.

The majority of the carbs in lychees comes from sugars, which are responsible for their sweet taste. They’re relatively low in fiber.

Vitamins and Minerals

Lychees are a decent source of several vitamins and minerals, including:

• Vitamin C: The most abundant vitamin in lychees. One lychee provides around 9% of the Reference Daily Intake (RDI) for vitamin C.
• Copper: Lychees are a decent source of copper. Inadequate copper intake may have adverse effects on heart health.
• Potassium: An essential nutrient that may improve heart health when eaten in sufficient amounts.

Possible Health Benefits

The health effects of lychees have not been studied yet.

However, including a variety of fruits and vegetables in your diet may improve your health and reduce your risk of several chronic diseases.

Lychees contain several healthy minerals, vitamins, and antioxidants, such as potassium, copper, vitamin C, epicatechin, and rutin. These may help protect against heart disease, cancer, and diabetes.

Animal studies also indicate that lychee extract may help fight liver cancer.

Still, further studies are needed to confirm the health benefits of lychees in humans.

Adverse Effects and Individual Concerns

When eaten in moderation as a part of a healthy diet, lychees do not have any known adverse health effects.

However, lychees have been associated with brain inflammation in South and Southeast Asia.

Whether lychees are responsible is not entirely clear, but scientists have hypothesized that the toxin hypoglycin A may be responsible. Further studies are needed.

Additionally, lychees may cause an allergic reaction in rare cases.

• Sunburn: What is sunburn?
• 
  What is the benefit of eating Napa cabbage?
• 
  What is the Health Benefits of Bok Choy?
• 
  What is the Health Benefits of Watercress?
• West Nile virus: What is West Nile virus?
• How Much Caffeine Is in White Tea?