You don’t have to look at many health food advertisements to see how many marketing messages focus on antioxidants and free radicals. Marketers depict free radicals as the cause of human suffering, while antioxidants are the ultimate defense and secret to immortality. Although the ad wizards exaggerate the truth, free radicals do, in fact, corrupt molecules like DNA, and antioxidants can help reduce the damage they cause.
The mitochondria in our cells are responsible for releasing energy from the molecules in our food, but they also unleash electron-stealing free radicals like reactive oxygen and reactive nitrogen species. Fortunately, antioxidants scavenge free radicals and prevent them from causing further damage.