Antioxidants and antioxidant supplements - increase your body's immune system - protect from free radicals!

Since the discovery of vitamins, it has been recognized that antioxidants are essential for healthful lives in humans and many other mammals. More recently, a large body of evidence has accumulated that suggests supplementation of the diet with various kinds of antioxidants can improve health and extend life. These supplements may include specific antioxidant chemicals, like resveratrol (from grape seeds), combinations of antioxidants, like the "ACES" products that contain beta carotene (pro vitamin A), vitamin c , vitamin e and Selenium, or specialty herbs that are known to contain antioxidants such as green tea and jiaogulan: Doctors Best, Dr. Venessa, Earthrise, Green foods, Kyolic, Maitake, Twinlab.

An antioxidant is a chemical that reduces the rate of particular oxidation reactions in a specific context, where oxidation reactions are chemical reactions that involve the transfer of electrons from a substance to an oxidizing agent.

Antioxidants are particularly important in the context of organic chemistry and biology: all living cells contain complex systems of antioxidant chemicals and enzymes to prevent chemical damage to the cells' components by oxidation.

A diet containing polyphenol antioxidants from plants is required for the health of most mammals, since plants are an important source of organic antioxidant chemicals. Antioxidants are widely used as ingredients in dietary supplements that are used for health purposes such as preventing cancer and heart disease.

One major action of antioxidants in cells is to prevent damage due to the action of reactive oxygen species. Reactive oxygen species include hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), the super oxide anion (O2−), and free radicals such as the hydroxyl radical (·OH). These molecules are unstable and highly reactive, and can damage cells by chemical chain reactions such as lipid peroxidation, or formation of DNA adducts that can lead to cancer-promoting mutations or cell death. All cells therefore contain antioxidants that serve to reduce or prevent this damage.

How antioxidants preserve health...

Antioxidants are chemicals that reduce oxidative damage to cells and biomolecules. Researchers have found a high correlation between oxidative damage and the occurrence of disease. For example, low density lipoprotein (LDL) oxidation is associated with cardiovascular disease. The process leading to atherogenesis, arteriosclerosis, and cardiovascular disease is complex, involving multiple chemical pathways and networks, but the precursor is LDL oxidation by free radicals, resulting in inflammation and formation of plaques.

Research suggests that consumption of antioxidant-rich foods reduces damage to cells and protects our cells from free radicals. This may slow down, prevent, or even reverse certain diseases that result from cellular damage, and perhaps even slow down the natural aging process. This is the basis for the free-radical theory of aging.

Some of the reactions in the body that produce free radicals involve metal ions. Some antioxidants, such as the tannins in walnuts and tea, chelate (wrap around) metal ions. This not only reduces the formation of ion-dependent free radicals, but also prevents the metal ions from oxidizing cells.

By destroying free radicals and reducing cellular damage, antioxidants, as a group, can:

• Promote eye health and prevent macular degeneration, cataracts, and other degenerative eye diseases. The benefits of antioxidants were examined during the Age-Related Eye Disease Study.
• Keep the immune system in good shape, or boost the immune system when it has been compromised.
• Prevent age-related neurodegeneration such as decline of the brain and nervous system.
• Prevent DNA damage and therefore have anticarcinogenic effects.
• Have antiatherogenic effects; that is, promote cardiovascular health and help prevent arteriosclerosis, heart attacks, strokes, and other cardiovascular diseases. Antioxidants can decrease LDL and cholesterol, increase high density lipoprotein(HDL), and lower blood pressure.