Our bodies are heat-generating machines that depend on oxygen to carry out basic metabolic functions. One of the by-products of this use of oxygen, or “oxidation,” is oxygen molecules that have been transformed into what are known as “free radicals.” Free radicals are generated by the body’s own metabolic systems. In addition, the environment is teeming with them in the form of cigarette smoke, pollution, certain foods, and chemicals. Even your drinking water and the sun that warms your face on an April morning are creating free radicals.
These free radicals, which are constantly proliferating throughout our bodies, are missing an electron. This makes them highly unstable. Driven to restore the missing electron, they seek out replacement molecules from whatever neighboring cells they can attack. Sometimes their targets are DNA, sometimes enzymes, sometimes important proteins in neighboring cells, and sometimes they attack the cell membrane itself. It’s been estimated that each cell experiences ten thousand free-radical hits each day.
Clearly, no living being could survive for long without some powerful system of defense against free radicals. Antioxidants are the foot soldiers in the battle to disarm free radicals in our bodies. They neutralize free radicals, and, in effect, minimize their threat by giving up an electron in an effort to stabilize them. Stabilized, the free radicals are no longer a threat to cellular health.
Our bodies produce many antioxidants on their own, but the antioxidants in foods play a critical role in keeping free radicals in check.
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