Nearly everyone has heard of antioxidants,
but have you ever wondered exactly what bioflavonoid antioxidants actually
do? The story of antioxidants begins
with free radicals. Free radicals are
actually a normal part of our body, in fact some of them work in our immune
system, so they are not necessarily all harmful, unless there are too many of
them. Free radicals form as part of our
metabolic processes and are actually only atoms that have lost an
electron. Each atom in our body exists
in a state of balance between the protons (positively charged molecules) and
the negatively charged electrons. At
times, an extra proton can be added to the nucleus of the atom, upsetting the
balance, or an electron can simply be lost from one reason or another.
When an atom loses an electron, it becomes
unstable and tries to gain an electron to return to normal. The trouble is, it tries to steal an electron
from nearby atoms. The newly unstable
atom thus created tries to gain and electron, and so it goes, in a nasty chain
reaction that ultimately damages the cell.
It can interfere with the ability of the cell to function or even go
rogue, such as happens with cancer. You
can see how important it is to stop the chain reaction caused by these free
radicals before too much damage is done.
The damage free radicals are responsible for are also associated with
aging, diabetes, and heart disease.
On the plus side, our bodies do make
antioxidants themselves, precisely to deal with free radicals. Unfortunately, however, due to stress,
fatigue, pollution, smoking, or a poor diet, we can come up short on the number
of antioxidants we need to deal with these troublemakers, which allows the free
radicals to harm us.
Nature has been generous, however, and has
provided a number of fruits and vegetables with bioflavonoid antioxidants. Fruits such as acai berry, grapes,
strawberries, and blueberries all contain high amounts of antioxidants. When we eat these fruits, we release the
antioxidants into our systems and they go to work immediately to neutralize the
free radicals.
The reason that antioxidants are able to
stop the destructive chain reaction caused by the free radicals is because they
have plenty of electrons. As soon as
they get near a free radical, an electron will be shed and the free radical
will take it up, stabilizing the atom.
As the bioflavonoid antioxidants have a generous supply of electrons,
they can stop the destructive avalanche before it causes serious damage to the
cell. A diet rich in foods that provide
a high amount of antioxidants, or a acai berry supplement
could definitely be beneficial to your metabolism – keeping it healthier and
more likely to remain free of disease.
