This 2019 Spanish human study ran in parallel with Our model clinical trial for Changing to a youthful phenotype with broccoli sprouts. I’ll focus on the aspect of diindolylmethane (DIM) from eating broccoli sprouts:

“The aim of this study is to evaluate the effect of gender or hormonal status (menopause) on the bioavailability of broccoli sprouts in different cohorts of overweight adult subjects: men, non-menopausal women and post-menopausal women.

3,3′-diindolylmethane (DIM) was detected and quantified in all volunteers. It increased significantly during broccoli [sprouts] ingestion in men. However, a steady decrease of its urinary concentration was observed in post-menopausal women that was significant at day 50. No significant changes were observed in premenopausal women. Albeit this different behaviour, no significant differences between the three groups were detected by the different statistical tests performed.

High increases observed in SFN-metabolites in the three cohorts confirm that the fresh product is a good source of bioactive compounds bioavailable in the organism. We detected high amounts of 3,3-DIM in urine samples, which can be related to the metabolism of glucobrassicin derivatives from our broccoli sprouts.

Post-menopausal women seem to metabolize isothiocyanates in a greater extension. Hormonal status and differences in gut microbiota may influence the bioavailability of isothiocyanates from broccoli sprouts but more studies are needed to support this statement.”

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1756464619303147 “Bioavailability of broccoli sprouts in different human overweight populations” (not freely available)

“Post-menopausal women seem to metabolize isothiocyanates in a greater extension. A steady decrease of its [DIM] urinary concentration was observed in post-menopausal women that was significant at day 50.”

Subjects ate 30 grams of broccoli super sprouts every day through Day 35, then stopped, and were measured again at Day 50. The only example of measurements where Day 35 was less than Day 0 was postmenopausal women metabolizing more DIM.

That Day 35 data point didn’t have an asterisk next to it to indicate a statistically significant decrease. But the overweight postmenopausal women group’s next Day 50 significant “steady decrease” finding supported an interpretation that eating broccoli sprouts supplied them with DIM that they especially needed.

Regarding the huge percentage changes above, our model clinical trial found in a longer time frame:

The decrease in IL-6 levels was significantly related to the increase in 24 h urine SFN [sulforaphane] levels. In case of C-reactive protein, the decrease was significantly related to the increases in 24 h urine SFN-NAC [SFN-N-acetylcysteine] and SFN-CYS [SFN-cysteine].

I’ll guess that these parallel trial subjects also experienced similar benefits from eating broccoli  sprouts every day for five weeks. See Day 70 results from Changing to a youthful phenotype with broccoli sprouts for another guess that even shorter time frames would be effective.

Broccoli super sprout indolic compounds were as follows:

Assuming that only glucobrassicin is a precursor to DIM, subjects’ DIM bioavailability can be calculated as μmol DIM / 21.61 μmol. For example, overweight postmenopausal women Day 35 average of 0.5544 μmol DIM that ranged from 0.1771 to 0.8034 μmol DIM represented an average 2.57% DIM bioavailability with a range of 0.82% to 3.72% DIM bioavailability.

See Part 2 for DIM follow-up.