With all the scientific interest, and not-so-scientific hype regarding 
antioxidants I've been reading lately, I gave some thought to it.  It 
seems to me that given their function -- preventing damage to DNA and 
thereby reducing the chances of cancer -- all multicellular and probably 
most unicellular organisms must have a suite of antioxidant chemicals 
evolved to the optimal balance between longer life and cellular 
efficiency.

It occurs to me that there is an explanation why all the antioxidants 
we're hearing so much about occur in plants rather than animals.  
Animals must have antioxidants as well but most of those in animals are 
similar to the ones our body produces so introducing them into our 
system causes our body to produce less of our native antioxidants.  
Plant antioxidants are presumably different enough from ours that our 
body doesn't recognize it.

-- 
|                   Andrew Glasgow                     |
|"It is quite obvious that, like a trite archetype of the
"scumbag lawyer",  |
|Johnson thinks he can force reality to conform to his wishes by out-debating|
|everyone who disagrees. Reality is unimpressed. -- Eric Gill in talk.origins|
---
þ RIMEGate(tm)/RGXPost V1.14 at BBSWORLD * Info{at}bbsworld.com

---
 * RIMEGate(tm)V10.2áÿ* RelayNet(tm) NNTP Gateway * MoonDog BBS
 * RgateImp.MoonDog.BBS at 12/27/03 6:40:16 AM