What Exactly Are Free Radicals and How Can We Protect Ourselves?
Free radicals are molecular species with unpaired electrons.
They have a very short life, we are talking trillionths of a second or less.
Nevertheless, these radicals are aggressive with the chemical reactions created within our cells, they can inflict considerable damage to them.
So, in other words, a free radical is an atom with a missing electron,.
When these radicals enter our bodies they penetrate our cells and take electron from our cell causing it to oxidize.
Now don't get me wrong, not everything about free radicals is bad for the cell, they play a central roll in respiration: Oxygen, the giver of life, is also our enemy.
You see, while it is absolutely indispensable for life, oxygen's involvement in the cell's respiratory process is what makes us grow old.
There is a constant flow of energy moving through every living cell in our bodies, this means there is a transfer of electrons from one molecule to the next.
Every time a molecule gives up electrons it is oxidized and when it accepts an electron it is reduced.
This process is called respiration.
So, aside from the central roll free radicals play in the process of respiration, they are important for many other biological processes.
To name some of them: their production is central for the body's immune response, for the killing of bacteria, and the initiation of the inflammatory response.
Stated more simply, free radicals are like relationships - can't live with them, can't live without them.
The issue here is about balance.
In normal conditions the body can handle them, but if antioxidants are unavailable damage will occur, and this accumulates with age.
That is why to fight them we need antioxidants.
Antioxidants neutralize free radicals since they donate one of their electrons, preventing them to take such electrons form our cells.
Unfortunately with today's lifestyle it is almost impossible to get antioxidants from diet alone.
We must use supplements, especially children who are eating the most over-processed foods of all time.
There is practically no nutritional value and these over-processed foods are also full of these annoying little guys (radicals).
They have a very short life, we are talking trillionths of a second or less.
Nevertheless, these radicals are aggressive with the chemical reactions created within our cells, they can inflict considerable damage to them.
So, in other words, a free radical is an atom with a missing electron,.
When these radicals enter our bodies they penetrate our cells and take electron from our cell causing it to oxidize.
Now don't get me wrong, not everything about free radicals is bad for the cell, they play a central roll in respiration: Oxygen, the giver of life, is also our enemy.
You see, while it is absolutely indispensable for life, oxygen's involvement in the cell's respiratory process is what makes us grow old.
There is a constant flow of energy moving through every living cell in our bodies, this means there is a transfer of electrons from one molecule to the next.
Every time a molecule gives up electrons it is oxidized and when it accepts an electron it is reduced.
This process is called respiration.
So, aside from the central roll free radicals play in the process of respiration, they are important for many other biological processes.
To name some of them: their production is central for the body's immune response, for the killing of bacteria, and the initiation of the inflammatory response.
Stated more simply, free radicals are like relationships - can't live with them, can't live without them.
The issue here is about balance.
In normal conditions the body can handle them, but if antioxidants are unavailable damage will occur, and this accumulates with age.
That is why to fight them we need antioxidants.
Antioxidants neutralize free radicals since they donate one of their electrons, preventing them to take such electrons form our cells.
Unfortunately with today's lifestyle it is almost impossible to get antioxidants from diet alone.
We must use supplements, especially children who are eating the most over-processed foods of all time.
There is practically no nutritional value and these over-processed foods are also full of these annoying little guys (radicals).
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