Table of contents:
- How do antioxidants work in the body?
- What are the sources of antioxidants?
- Antioxidants and disease prevention
Have you heard of free radicals? The components that are said to cause various kinds of diseases are around you everyday. Free radicals are byproducts of processing food into energy. In addition, you can also get free radicals from food, air, and even from your body's reaction to sunlight. Well, our bodies have a special defense mechanism to ward off the bad effects of free radicals, namely antioxidants.
There are two types of antioxidants, namely endogenous which is produced by the body, and exogenous which is obtained from outside the body, especially from food. Although it can produce its own antioxidants, the body tends to rely more on antioxidants that come from outside. These antioxidants will work by giving electrons to free radical molecules so that they neutralize the bad nature of these free radicals.
How do antioxidants work in the body?
The way antioxidants work is related to how free radicals work. Free radicals in the body are molecules that have free electrons, where electrons should be paired. These free electrons make free radicals so reactive that they can cause damage to surrounding cells. Due to the nature of the paired electrons, the free electrons present in these free radical molecules can donate electrons or accept electrons from the molecules of healthy body cells. Healthy body cell molecules will then behave the same as free radicals, giving rise to many other free radicals. The reactive free radicals then affect the membrane to the cell nucleus and damage the components inside a cell, triggering the cell to destroy itself. Although they can attack all types of cells, free radicals mainly attack fat cells, nucleic acid cells, and proteins.
The main function of antioxidants is to donate electrons to unpaired electrons contained in free radical molecules, preventing these free electrons from attracting electrons from healthy body cells. What is special about the work of antioxidants is that after giving electrons, the antioxidants will not turn into free radicals as if other cells gave electrons. So that the work of antioxidants such as neutralizing the reactive properties of free radical molecules.
What are the sources of antioxidants?
There are many vitamins and phytonutrients, antioxidants you can easily find in your daily food and drink. Examples of antioxidants are vitamin C, vitamin E, and carotenoids such as lutein, beta carotene, and lycopene which are found in many vegetables and fruits. Vitamin E helps protect body cells from damage that can cause cancer, heart disease, and eye disease. Vitamin E usually works in conjunction with vitamin C to prevent various degenerative diseases. Vitamin E you can find in oil derived from plants, products whole grains, seeds, and nuts.
Apart from vitamin E, vitamin C is perhaps the most widely recognized type of antioxidant. Helping to protect the body from infection, preventing cell damage, to helping the production of collagen which functions to attach bones to muscles are some of the benefits of vitamin C. You can find vitamin C in citrus fruits, mangoes, papayas, strawberries, and vegetables such as tomatoes, broccoli, and potatoes.
Apart from coming from vitamins, antioxidants can also be found in phytonutrients, a component that is only found in vegetables and fruit and plays a role in giving the fruit a distinctive color or aroma. Phytonutrients from the carotenoid group contain lots of antioxidants. For example, there are beta carotene, lycopene, and lutein, which are abundant in carrots, tomatoes, and dark green vegetables such as broccoli and kale.
Antioxidants and disease prevention
As previously explained, antioxidants are able to ward off free radicals. If left unchecked, free radicals can cause damage to healthy body cells. Free radicals are suspected to be the cause of various diseases such as cancer, heart disease, reduced vision ability, and Alzheimer's. Antioxidants as neutralizing the reactive properties of free radicals can prevent these diseases, but the effect will be greater if antioxidants are consumed in their natural form, not in supplement form.
Several studies have shown that the consumption of antioxidant supplements has little effect on the prevention of diseases caused by free radicals. Although these studies have their respective limitations, research related to the benefits of eating fruit vegetables rich in antioxidants actually gives positive results to fight the harmful effects of free radicals.
