ameliorate

The Japan Times onlineから英語表現を拾います。最近になって脂肪燃焼に効果があると言われているトマトですが、メタボを気にする中高年だけでなく若い女性にも人気があるようです。

Tomato boom goes beyond tastes as consumers look to trim waists

Tomatoes and tomato juice are selling well on hopes such foods can help combat metabolic syndrome.

The boom looks to last, given the growing popularity of tomatoes not only among middle-aged and senior citizens worried about body fat, but also younger women, analysts said.

The Omori store of Ito-Yokado Co. says it always stocks 20 different tomato varieties.

"We purchase and retail tomatoes both for raw consumption and cooking," said a salesclerk at the store.

More customers are buying yellow and orange varieties to add color to dishes, the clerk said.

The craze was heightened after a Kyoto University team in a joint research project announced in February that tomatoes contain substances capable of ameliorating abnormalities of lipid metabolism, such as fatty liver and high-level neutral fat.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20120904f2.html

今回取り上げる表現はameliorateです。ameliorateは「(ひどい状態から)〜を改良する、改善する」という意味(『ジーニアス英和辞典』、第4版、大修館書店)でimproveと同じ意味があります。この単語は反対語のdeteriorateと共にジャーナリズムで好まれて使われます。LDOCEで語義を確認すると、フォーマルな表現で"to make a bad situation better or less harmful"とありました。
この記事ではameliorateを用いる事で特にトマトの脂肪への作用が強調されているように思えます。(EnDough)