Inflammation is a process by which your body's white blood cells and the things they make protect you from infection from outside invaders, such as bacteria and viruses. Inflammation includes a long chain of molecular reactions and cellular activity. Inflammation is a major factor for the progression of various chronic diseases. including diabetes, cancer, cardiovascular diseases, eye disorder, arthritis, obesity, inflammatory bowel diseases and autoimmune diseases. In recent year, inflammation is one of the major target research areas among biomedical research including cellular process like phagocytosis, chemotaxsis, mitosis, cell differentiation. Inflammation can be beneficial of harmful. Inflammation can be actually divided into acute inflammation and chronic inflammation depending on various inflammatory process and cellular mechanisms.
Acute inflammation is a short procedure, lasting from minutes to few days and it is cause due to the leakage of plasma proteins or fluids and movement of leukocytes into an extravascular areas. There are three main steps in acute inflammation including enhanced blood flow to the inflammed area, followed by vasodilation and enhanced vascular permeability with the leakage of the plasma from the microcirculation.
Chronic inflammation is a vital response of human immune system. The state of chronic inflammation can have several secondary consequence associated with enhanced risk of chronic diseases and disorder. Persistence of foreign bodies, recurrent acute inflammation, continuous chemical exposure or specific pathogen are all crucial reasons for chronic inflammation.
In normal and healthy body condition, there is a balance between reactive oxygen species formation/free radical and endogenous antioxidant defense mechanisms. However, if this equilibrium is disturbed, it can lead to oxidative stress and associated damage. This oxidative stress condition can cause injury to all vital cellular components such as DNA, proteins, and membrane lipids and it may lead to cell death.
Free radicals are created as a consequence of ATP production by the mitochondria. Generally they are Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS) and Reactive Nitrogen Species (RNS) that result from the cellular redox process. At low or moderate levels, ROS and RNS exert beneficial effects on cellular responses and immune function.
However, free radicals also serve important functions that are essential for health. For example, your immune cells use free radicals to fight infections. As a result, your body needs to maintain a certain balance of free radicals and antioxidants. At high concentration free radical generate oxidative stress, a deleterious process that can damage all cell structures. Oxidative stress plays a major part in the development of chronic and degenerative ailments such as cancer, arthritis, aging, autoimmune disorders, cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases. Free radical reacts quickly with other substances trying to catch the required electron to obtain stability.
Free radical can become balanced by attacking the closest stable molecule and “stealing” its electrons. Meanwhile the attacked molecule can become a free radical by losing its electron and start a chain reaction cascade. Examples of free radicals are hydroxyl free radical, superoxide free radical anion, lipid peroxyl, lipid peroxide, and lipid alkoxyl. Currently, the impact of oxidative stress and its associated factors has become an important issue of human health. Endogenous enzymatic and nonenzymatic antioxidant substance are not able to handle the overload of ROS and lead to imbalances of the process, cell damage, and health problems. Lack of anti- oxidant in your daily diet usually lead to the development of the inflammatory diseases like cancer, neurodegenerative diseases, Alzheimer’s diseases, cardiovascular diseases.
Antioxidants are substances that can prevent or slow damage to cells caused by free radicals, unstable molecules that the body produces as a reaction to environmental and other pressures.
They are sometimes called “free-radical scavengers.” Antioxidants from our diet play an important role in helping endogenous antioxidants for the neutralization of oxidative stress. Incorporating sufficient anti-oxidant rich food in your daily diet from plant source can be suitable solution to solve human health issues.
The sources of antioxidants can be natural or artificial. Plant-based antioxidants are a kind of phytonutrient, or plant-based nutrient. The natural compound based antioxidant substances perform a preventive role in protecting against the generation of free radicals and therefore natural based antioxidants are one of the more valuable therapeutic agents to reduce the illnesses triggered by oxidative stress. The findings from anti-inflammatory researches have proven that bioactive extracts and their natural compounds exert their biological properties by blocking two major signaling pathways such as NF-KB and mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs) which have the main role in the production of various proinflammatory mediators. Without antioxidants, free radicals would cause serious harm very quickly eventually resulting in death.
