Johns Hopkins researchers have come up with yet another reason to eat — or even drink — your broccoli. A clinical trial involving nearly 300 men and women living in one of China's most polluted regions found that daily consumption of a half-cup of a broccoli sprout beverage helped rid their bodies of cancer-causing contaminants, NewsMax Health reports.

The study, published online in the journal Cancer Prevention Research, found the beverage produced "rapid, significant, and sustained higher levels of excretion of benzene, a known human carcinogen, and acrolein, a lung irritant," said the researchers from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

 They added that a plant compound in the beverage, sulforaphane, has been shown to have potent anti-cancer properties in animal studies.

"Air pollution is a complex and pervasive public health problem," noted John Groopman, a professor of environmental health at Johns Hopkins and one of the study's co-authors. "To address this problem comprehensively, in addition to the engineering solutions to reduce regional pollution emissions, we need to translate our basic science into strategies to protect individuals from these exposures. This study supports the development of food-based strategies as part of this overall prevention effort."

 Air pollution causes as many as seven million deaths a year worldwide, according to the World Health Organization. Last year, the International Agency for Research on Cancer classified air pollution and particulate matter from air pollution as carcinogenic to humans.

Diets rich in cruciferous vegetables, such as broccoli, have been found to reduce risk of chronic degenerative diseases, including cancer. Broccoli sprouts are a source of glucoraphanin, a compound that generates sulforaphane when the plant is chewed or a beverage made from the vegetable is swallowed. It increases enzymes that enhance the body's ability to eliminate such pollutants.