The term "Antioxidant" is tossed around like bags of peanuts at baseball games, yet few people know what it means. Here is a simple explanation. Imagine cars without spare tires. If a tire goes flat, the car is out of commission and has to wait for a repair truck to come with a new tire... or... it could steal a tire from another car so it can move again. If the car was traveling fast when it lost a tire, great damage could result from a crash. The car with a flat tire represents a free radical and the repair truck is the antioxidant providing a new tire to neutralize the free radical, or the free radical car steals a tire from another car turning that car now into a free radical. Antioxidants fix problems rather than letting the csacading or "stealing" of tires eventually lead to cell damage. In the body, free radicals can be generated from many normal everyday events as well as from the action of toxic chemicals, such as smoke or pesticides.
Definition: A free radical is simply a molecule that has lost one electron of a matched pair. The element searches for another electron to again establish stability. During this search time, the unstable molecule can damage other body elements, often sensitive DNA. Antioxidants supply the lost electron to prevent this damage. Antioxidants are stable when they give up an electron but are quicily eliminated out of the body. Alpha Lipoic Acid can regenerate vitamins C and E by replacing the lost electron so they can again function to stop another free radical.
Exercise develops increased free radical generation since more oxygen is taken in and greater energy is produced. Vitamin companies use this as part of their marketing story to sell antioxidant vitamins, but actually the exercising body generates greater efficiency in dealing with radicals by increasing the antioxidants naturally produced in the body. Studies reveal that taking too many antioxidants might reduce the benefits from exercise. Balance and Harmony. ref
ANTIOXIDANT BALANCE POINT INTREGRITY
Taking antioxidants is suppose to eliminate or neutralize free radicals thought to be the cause of some diseases. Check out this reference for antioxidant actions against lipid peroxidation. But, on the other side, since the body produces free radicals, are they always negative? NOT always. The body uses some free radicals for positive functions like killing viruses or destroying damaged cells. Nitric Oxide is a radical that has many beneficial functions, especially for artery health.
Does the free radical theory of aging need to be updated? Antioxidants play an important role in health. But one that is only partly understood by the health and vitamin industry. How much to take is still a matter of speculation.
CORRECTING FLAWED THEORIES
If Nutritional Science or the Vitamin Industry operate under flawed theories, one would imagine when truth emerges, a corrective process would dictate changes, or at the very least stir up research and debate. But that just doesn't seem to be happening with much volume on the antioxidant / free radical theory of aging. Both sides are both holding onto the last straws with all their might. Let go already!
The body uses some free radicals to perform beneficial functions. Taking too many antioxidants destroys these free radicals before they can perform their positive and necessary activities. Whether they are turning on insulin glucose uptake by cells or the destruction of cancer cells by programmed cell death methods. refANTIOXIDANT LOAD BALANCE is a critical part of health that is completely missing from nutritional health discussions. The new vitamin criteriaconsiders this aspect when establishing nutrient dosages and forms. And explains why the dosages are quite low compared to many other recommendations and available vitamin products.
INFLAMMATION CONNECTION
How can free radicals be dangerous and beneficial at the same time? There is an inflammatory link from potential free radical cell damage that primes the degenerative pump while some free radical actions are used by the body for positive outcomes (Nitrous Oxide, NO, on vascular vessel tone). Next is a study reference linking free radicals, inflammation, the gene transcription factor, NF_kB, oxidized LDL cholesterol, and pretty much the whole gambit of degenerative conditions. A MOST IMPORTANT ABSTRACT ref
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The term "Antioxidant" is tossed around like bags of peanuts at baseball games, yet few people know what it means. Here is a simple explanation. Imagine cars without spare tires. If a tire goes flat, the car is out of commission and has to wait for a repair truck to come with a new tire... or... it could steal a tire from another car so it can move again. If the car was traveling fast when it lost a tire, great damage could result from a crash. The car with a flat tire represents a free radical and the repair truck is the antioxidant providing a new tire to neutralize the free radical, or the free radical car steals a tire from another car turning that car now into a free radical. Antioxidants fix problems rather than letting the csacading or "stealing" of tires eventually lead to cell damage. In the body, free radicals can be generated from many normal everyday events as well as from the action of toxic chemicals, such as smoke or pesticides.
Definition: A free radical is simply a molecule that has lost one electron of a matched pair. The element searches for another electron to again establish stability. During this search time, the unstable molecule can damage other body elements, often sensitive DNA. Antioxidants supply the lost electron to prevent this damage. Antioxidants are stable when they give up an electron but are quicily eliminated out of the body. Alpha Lipoic Acid can regenerate vitamins C and E by replacing the lost electron so they can again function to stop another free radical.
Exercise develops increased free radical generation since more oxygen is taken in and greater energy is produced. Vitamin companies use this as part of their marketing story to sell antioxidant vitamins, but actually the exercising body generates greater efficiency in dealing with radicals by increasing the antioxidants naturally produced in the body. Studies reveal that taking too many antioxidants might reduce the benefits from exercise. Balance and Harmony. ref
ANTIOXIDANT BALANCE POINT INTREGRITY
Taking antioxidants is suppose to eliminate or neutralize free radicals thought to be the cause of some diseases. Check out this reference for antioxidant actions against lipid peroxidation. But, on the other side, since the body produces free radicals, are they always negative? NOT always. The body uses some free radicals for positive functions like killing viruses or destroying damaged cells. Nitric Oxide is a radical that has many beneficial functions, especially for artery health.
Does the free radical theory of aging need to be updated? Antioxidants play an important role in health. But one that is only partly understood by the health and vitamin industry. How much to take is still a matter of speculation.
CORRECTING FLAWED THEORIES
If Nutritional Science or the Vitamin Industry operate under flawed theories, one would imagine when truth emerges, a corrective process would dictate changes, or at the very least stir up research and debate. But that just doesn't seem to be happening with much volume on the antioxidant / free radical theory of aging. Both sides are both holding onto the last straws with all their might. Let go already!
The body uses some free radicals to perform beneficial functions. Taking too many antioxidants destroys these free radicals before they can perform their positive and necessary activities. Whether they are turning on insulin glucose uptake by cells or the destruction of cancer cells by programmed cell death methods. ref ANTIOXIDANT LOAD BALANCE is a critical part of health that is completely missing from nutritional health discussions. The new vitamin criteria considers this aspect when establishing nutrient dosages and forms. And explains why the dosages are quite low compared to many other recommendations and available vitamin products.
INFLAMMATION CONNECTION
How can free radicals be dangerous and beneficial at the same time? There is an inflammatory link from potential free radical cell damage that primes the degenerative pump while some free radical actions are used by the body for positive outcomes (Nitrous Oxide, NO, on vascular vessel tone). Next is a study reference linking free radicals, inflammation, the gene transcription factor, NF_kB, oxidized LDL cholesterol, and pretty much the whole gambit of degenerative conditions. A MOST IMPORTANT ABSTRACT ref