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The Iodine Group | |
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IodineSource
IodineIodineSource
"Iodine-containing compounds are found in ashes of burnt seaweed, salty oil-well brines and Chilean saltpeter, which is sodium iodate (NaIO3). Iodine is extracted in huge amounts by Japanese seaweed farming. Originally, during the formation of the earth, iodine dispersed throughout rock formations. Much later ocean water, plants and animals also contained iodine in low amounts. It was abundant, however, in seaweeds. Detoxified Iodine can be supplemented by placing a few drops in water daily to provide adequate amounts to the body."
"The most significant evolutionary event for eukaryotes (nucleated celled organisms), including humans, occurred when seaweeds concentrated iodine. From this process came multicellular organisms, vertebrates and humans. Because iodine was not available in significant concentrations for much of evolution, single-celled organisms reproduced themselves with structural membrane proteins having the amino acids tyrosine or histidine exposed to the surrounding medium or extra-cellular fluids. Iodine kills single celled organisms by combining with these same two amino acids. All single celled organisms showing tyrosine (tyrosyl) linkages exposed in the membrane proteins are killed by this simple chemical reaction that denatures proteins and destroys enzymes, killing the cells.
"Seaweed was the first to start capturing iodine from ocean water by a membrane transport mechanism that today still concentrates iodine to 20,000 times the ocean's concentration. What is not generally appreciated, and perhaps not thought of in this light, was that the high concentrations of iodine in seaweed, whether the seaweed was dead or alive, gave birth to a brand new environment chemically different from the rest of the planet up to that time. This was the world of high iodine...."
"The thyroid gland is a factory. To produce its secretions it must have raw material. If it lacks adequate raw materials, its production slumps. When this happens, when the slump is great enough, there may be signals from elsewhere in the body that amount to exhortations for the gland to increase its output. Trying to oblige, the gland may increase in size in a kind of blind effort to add to its output even though it cannot increase production for lack of raw material. The gland may enlarge until a noticeable lump may appear in the throat. And the swelling, or goiter, may become large enough to interfere with breathing or swallowing. The cause of goiter is lack of sufficient iodine in the soil and drinking water, or from inability to utilize iodine because of mercury toxicity from amalgam dental fillings and from mercury in immunizations.
"The thyroid gland is the principle user of iodine in the body. Two-thirds of the body's store of iodine is located in the thyroid gland. In a normal person, dietary iodine is absorbed from the gut into the blood and then, in the thyroid, it is removed from the blood, "trapped" in the gland, and incorporated there into compounds, which in turn are assembled into thyroid hormone secretions. The average iodine intake of a normal adult on an ordinary diet in a non-goiter region is about 0.03 milligrams, a day. This tiny amount is only about one-seventh of what is needed for daily thyroid hormone production, but the body practices great economy and re-uses much of its iodine store repeatedly in producing hormone secretions.
"The main function of the iodine is synthesis, storage and secretion of thyroid hormone. What iodine is left over is taken up in other tissues especially extracellular fluids and excreted in the urine. From extracellular fluids iodine travels in the lymphatics and re-enters the blood stream via the main lymphatic channel, the thoracic duct. In the 1960s it was established that if the daily dose of iodine was increased to over 2-3 mgs of iodine per day, within two weeks, the thyroid became saturated and no longer took up iodine in significant amounts. So a normal person who raised their daily dose of iodine above, say 3 mgs, within two weeks their thyroid was almost completely stop taking up iodine as it became saturated, but more important to the body, all of the dietary iodine now went to perform other body functions.
"Iodine and Apoptosis In areas of the body, where many cells die, (apoptosis) there is always an endless source of iodine. All the sites in the body of high apoptosis (natural death of cells on a regular and predictable schedule) find iodine in plentiful supply. The secretions into the nasal passages and lumen of the stomach, for instance, have both a high death rate and an endless supply of iodine. Not only is iodine an antiseptic against bacteria, it also is an anticancer agent.
"Iodine Excretion in the Urine Iodine has an unusual excretion pattern in the urine. There are no reabsorption mechanisms or preservation mechanisms in the urinary tract to keep this element from excretion in the urine and hence loss from the body. Iodine is the trigger mechanism for apoptosis and it is imperative that a constant source of iodine in the urine be available. If the body was capable, and it is not, of holding the iodine inside and therefore allowing urine with no iodine to flow through the renal system, then the renal system would be deprived of iodine. This would immediately lead to abnormal cells and cancer. The Western diet contains nowhere near the levels of iodine needed to saturate the thyroid. An increase of at least 10 times would be helpful, but more effective would be levels that are comparable to the Japanese, having the highest daily intake of iodine and the lowest rates of cancer in the world.
"Iodine and Lipids One of the ways to measure the number of double bonds in fat is to measure the amount of iodine 100 grams of fat will take up. This is called the iodine number or value. The most unsaturated fat has the highest iodine value. Dietary fat removes iodine from the diet. Iodine protects double bonds while they are being transported to the sites where they are needed such as blood vessels and synaptic membranes of the central nervous system.
"Iodine and Pregnancy During pregnancy the placenta captures iodine to the point of raising the levels in the fetal circulation to five times the mother's level. As there are a huge number of cells dying by apoptosis during fetal growth, so iodine is of importance to the fetal development. The brain has more apoptosis going on during development than most other organs, so it follows that low iodine can cause abnormal brain development. Early fetal development is partly under the guidance of maternal thyroid hormones that have crossed the placenta, but it is theorized that the primitive cells at the beginning of fetal development still have the ability to make thyroid hormone themselves for their own use as in the early evolution of eukaryotes.
In 1912 it was shown that thyroid hormones would change a tadpole into a frog. This metamorphosis is complex at all levels. The tails dissolve away, legs are developed on the side, the lungs are changed over to air breathing, and the liver, without any detectable change in the DNA or cellular morphology, changes over biochemical mechanisms from an ocean water animal to a land animal. Although the effects of thyroid hormone appear to be systemic in the tadpole, in fact, thyroid hormone is affecting each cell individually. But more importantly, if the thyroid gland is removed and iodine is given in any form--injection, orally or in the bathing solution--metamorphosis will carry along at the same rate as if thyroid hormone was present. This suggests that the ability of tadpoles to synthesize thyroid hormone from iodine alone is retained inside every cell. If these phenomena of intracellular synthesis of thyroxine have been carried over from the first days of eukaryote genesis, it is likely that human fetal development, also in its early stages, is dependent on thyroxine manufactured from iodine within the cells. The only factor which completely eliminates cretinism, hypothyroidism in the fetus, and mental retardation is iodine, given by any means, as long as it is adequate--before conception.
"Japanese women, who consume the highest amounts of dietary iodine per woman in the world, have the lowest rate of stillbirth and perinatal and infant mortality in the world. Among the folklore of Japanese mothers is the interesting concept that seaweed will prevent cancer.
"Functions of Iodine in the Human Body
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