Antioxidant supplements in exercise: worse than useless?

TO THE EDITOR: In a recent paper by Higashida et al. (5), the authors report that very large doses of antioxidant vitamins do not prevent the exercise-induced adaptive responses of muscle mitochondria, GLUT4, and insulin action to exercise. As clearly stated in the paper, their data disagree with those reported by three independent research groups from Germany (14), Australia (17), and Spain (4). Using a significantly different experimental protocol regarding exercise training intensity and duration, antioxidant supplementation (doses and types of antioxidants), and molecular parameters analyzed (mRNA vs. protein levels), Higashida et al. compared their data with ours and came to exactly th…

40(th) EASD Annual Meeting of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes : Munich, Germany, 5-9 September 2004

The Friedreich's Ataxia protein frataxin modulates DNA base excision repair in prokaryotes and mammals

DNA-repair mechanisms enable cells to maintain their genetic information by protecting it from mutations that may cause malignant growth. Recent evidence suggests that specific DNA-repair enzymes contain ISCs (iron–sulfur clusters). The nuclearencoded protein frataxin is essential for the mitochondrial biosynthesis of ISCs. Frataxin deficiency causes a neurodegenerative disorder named Friedreich's ataxia in humans. Various types of cancer occurring at young age are associated with this disease, and hence with frataxin deficiency. Mice carrying a hepatocyte-specific disruption of the frataxin gene develop multiple liver tumours for unresolved reasons. In the present study, we show that frata…