Ionized Water: The Antioxidant Powerhouse - Unveiling Health Secrets
By Dr. K. Carlo Cortella Ph.D; N.D.
Below article on Ionized Water discusses its importance in health, emphasizing water's role in life and chemical reactions. It explores the significance of water's pH balance and redox potential, highlighting the harmful effects of free radicals. Ionized water, created through electrolysis, is presented as a superior antioxidant, offering health benefits by providing free electrons to neutralize free radicals. This makes ionized water an effective solution for maintaining health and preventing oxidative damage in the body.
All life on earth is thought to have arisen from water. The bodies of all living organisms are composed largely of water. About 70 to 90 percent of all organic matter is water.
The chemical reactions in all plants and animals that support life take place in a water medium. Water not only provides the medium to make these life sustaining reactions possible, but water itself is often an important reactant or product of these reactions.
To understand the functioning of water in maintaining energy and strength, we need to understand the meaning of reduction, oxidation and redox potential (ORP). Reduction means the addition of an electron (e-), and its converse, oxidation means the removal of an electron. The addition of an electron, reduction, stores energy in the reduced compound. The removal of an electron, oxidation, liberates energy from the oxidized compound. Whenever one substance is reduced, another is oxidized.
In biological systems, removal or addition of an electron constitutes the most frequent mechanism of oxidation-reduction reactions. These oxidation-reduction reactions are frequently called redox reactions.
An acid is a substance that increases the concentration of hydrogen ions (H+) in water. A base is a substance that decreases the concentration of hydrogen ions, in other words, increasing the concentration of hydroxide ions OH-.
The degree of acidity or alkalinity of a solution is measured in terms of a value known as pH, which is the negative logarithm of the concentration of hydrogen ions.
At pH 7, water contains equal concentrations of H+ and OH- ions. Substances with a pH higher than 7 are alkaline because they contain a higher concentration of OH- than H+.
Importance of balancing pH
Most of the free radicals ( active oxygen is one of the worst of them) with unpaired electrons are unstable and have a high oxidation potential, which means they are capable of stealing electrons from other cells, healthy cells. This chemical mechanism is very useful in disinfectants such as hydrogen peroxide and ozone which can be used to sterilize wounds or medical instruments.
Problems arise, however, when too many of these active oxygen molecules, or free radicals, are produced in the body, such as during a race not to speak about a long distance race.
They are extremely reactive and can also attach themselves to normal, healthy cells and damage them genetically. These active oxygen radicals steal electrons from normal, healthy biological molecules. This electron theft by active oxygen oxidizes tissue and can cause disease and pain.
Because active oxygen can damage normal tissue, it is essential to scavenge this active oxygen from the body before it can cause disintegration of healthy tissue.
The solution is water but not all waters are equal!
If we can find an effective method to block the oxidation of healthy tissue by active oxygen, then we can attempt to prevent disease and injuries.
One way to protect healthy tissue from the ravages of oxidation caused by active oxygen is to provide free electrons to active oxygen radicals, thus neutralizing their high oxidation potential and preventing them from reacting with healthy tissue.
In natural medicine we believe that substances that prevent oxidation - called ANTIOXIDANTS - can block the damage (vitamin C, vitamin E, beta-carotene, selenium). Indeed these substances are infinitely less effective than ionized-energized water!
Water, the natural solution
Water treated by electrolysis to increase its reduction potential is the best solution to the problem of providing a safe source of free electrons to block the oxidation of normal tissue by free oxygen radicals. I believe that reduced water, water with an excess of free electrons to donate to active oxygen, is the best solution because:
The reduction potential of water can be dramatically increased over other antioxidants in food or vitamin supplements.
The molecule weight of reduced water is low, making it fast acting and able to reach all tissues of the body in a very short time.
What is IONIZED WATER?
Ionized water is the product of mild electrolysis which takes place in the ionized water unit. Ionized water is treated tap water that has not only been filtered, but has also been reformed in that it provides reduced water with a large mass of electrons that can be donated to active oxygen in the body to block the oxidation of normal cells.
Redox potential, not pH, is the crucial factor
Traditionally we have judged the properties of water from the standpoint of pH, in other words whether water is acidic or alkaline.
The importance of pH is over emphasized. But nothing has been discussed about ORP, or oxidation-reduction potential.
The pH of tap water is about pH 7, or neutral. When tap water is electrolyzed into Ionized Water, its reduced water has a pH of about 9. Even if you make alkaline water of pH 9 by adding sodium hydroxide or make acidic water of pH 3 by adding hydrogen chloride, you will find very little change in the ORP values of the two waters. On the other hand, when you divide tap water with electrolysis you can see the ORP fluctuate by as much as +- 1,000 mV. By electrolysis we can obtain reduced water with negative potential that is good for the body.
When taken internally, the reduced Ionized Water with its redox potential of -250 to -350 mV readily donates its electrons to oddball oxygen radicals and blocks the interaction of the active oxygen with normal molecules.
When taken internally, the effects of reduced water are immediate. Ionized Water inhibits excessive fermentation in the digestive tract by reducing indirectly metabolites such as hydrogen sulfide, ammonia, histamines, indoles, phenols and scatoles, resulting in better digestion and lever detox.
In 1965, the Ministry of Welfare of Japan announced that reduced water obtained from electrolysis can prevent abnormal fermentation of intestinal microbes.
Ionized Water superior to antioxidant diet
Today we read much about correct dieting principles and paying attention to what we eat in order to stay healthy. This is a sensible practice, but it is surprising that many of us don't realize that the bulk of what eat is composed of water. Vegetables and fruits are 90% water; fish and meat are about 70% water as well.
Ionized Water, with its low molecular weight and high reduction potential, makes it a superior scavenging agent of active oxygen. But electrolysis inside the Ionized Water unit not only charges the reduced water with electrons, it also reduces the size of reduced water molecule clusters.
The clusterization of water is a process similar to energization of water. You can see two pictures of the same water after having been ionized.
Untreated tap water
Tap water filtered and ionized
The ordered clusterized water is readily absorbable by the body than untreated tap water. Ionized Water quickly permeates the body and blocks the oxidation of biological molecules by donating its abundant electrons to active oxygen, enabling biological molecules to replace themselves naturally without damage caused by oxidation that can cause diseases.
Downstream from the digestive tract, starting at the liver, reduced water quickly enters the liver and other organs due to, first, its lower molecular weight, and, secondly, the size of its clusters. At tissue sites throughout the body, reduced water with its safe, yet potent reduction potential readily donates its passenger electrons freely to active oxygen and neutralizes them so they cannot damage the molecules of healthy cells. Normal cells are protected from the electron thievery of active oxygen and allowed to grow, mature, function and regenerate without interference from rogue, oddball oxygen radicals which tend to steal the electrons from the molecules of normal, healthy biological molecules.