Build Muscle – Get Strong

If you have any interest in how your body is aging – and I would think everyone over the age of fifty will pay a lot of attention to this question, then you should learn a little something about the Free Radical Theory of Aging. If you’ve never heard of free radicals, I can assure you that they are not politically motivated, but are quite distructive never the less. Free radicals are unstable or damaged molecules that need to steal an electron from another nearby molecule in order to restablize themselves. In so doing they create another unstable molecule and the cycle repeats – creating a chain reaction that damages the systems in your body starting right at the cellular level.

Antioxidants are nature’s answer to free radicals. These are molecules that are capable of donating an electron to a free radical without becoming unstable themselves. They halt the chain reaction and prevent the damage.

Our bodies are machines and like other machines, the breakdowns start small (at the level of our cells) and build up until systems – like our immune system or respiratory system or nervous system – can no longer function properly with so many little bits of them clogged with cellular garbage and just not working properly.

But where do these damaged molecules – these free radicals come from? Two places actually. We pick them up from the outside world through sources like air pollution, drugs, toxins like cigarette smoke and pesticides. We also make them ourselves, because the necessary chemical processes that run our bodies porduce by-products primarily as oxyradicals- free radicals.

Our bodies make free radicals in different ways.

Out metabolism burns oxygen to create energy. Ideally we would completely convert oxygen molecules to water, but there are by products – free radicals.

Our own white blood cells use oxidants to combat viruses and parasites and bacteria and chronic infections will expose our tissues to free radicals. Some processes that break down fatty acids and other molecules can result in hydrogen peroxide escaping from the antioxidants that should have broken it down, and damaging other cells.

Out bodies produce, free radicals in millions of and millions of cells and do it almost constantly. Luckily we also have the ability to produce the remedy in the form of powerful free radical scavengers like CoEnzymeQ10 and Glutathione.

The final process through which our body produces free radicals – that age us – is the same process that’s also one of our primary defenses against drugs, pesticides and other toxic foreign chemicals. There is an enzyme called cytochrome P450 which our body uses for this job, but in calling up a supply of this enzyme, the body also produces oxidants – more free radicals. You can see what a double whammy drugs, pesticides and external toxic substances are- not only do they damage us in and of themselves, it ages us to fight them.

With the abundance of oxidants available to damage our cells and age us, it’s important to ensure that we promote the production of antioxidants to fight them. They are among our best anti-aging and immune supporting defense systems. Among them C0Q10 and glutathione are incredibly important antioxidants to combat the damaging effects of free radicals.

Anna Ruth loves to write about health and her articles cover a wide range of subject from gluathione supplements to anti aging supplements

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