Oxidative stress & Antioxidants

Oxidative stress, as one of the most common types of toxicity, is defined by an imbalance between the generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and the ability of biological systems to detoxify ROS or its related damage.
Many types of chemical, physical, and microbial agents can potentially induce oxidative-mediated stress in cells and tissues by damaging the biological components, including proteins, lipids, and DNA. Additionally, it has been proved that oxidative stress reactions can interfere with many essential biological processes such as phagocytosis (immunity and inflammation), cell respiration (mitochondria), metal metabolism, lipid synthesis, lysosomes, xenobiotic biotransformation of organic compounds and cellular signaling.
A series of antioxidant compounds function to reduce the damaging effects of ROS. These compounds are either produced naturally in human body (endogenous) or obtained via nutrients (exogenous).  Endogenous antioxidants are classified into two subgroups of enzymatic such as dismutase, reductase, catalase, peroxidase, etc. and non-enzymatic such as glutathione, bilirubin, metallothioneins, and uric acid. However, as the amount of free radicals is often higher than the capacity of endogenous antioxidants to detoxify, it is necessary to obtain some antioxidants from external sources (vitamin A, vitamin C, and vitamin E) to balance the disequilibrium.
In this regards, ZellX provides different colorimetric-based assays to evaluate the amount of both enzymatic and non-enzymatic antioxidants in oxidative stress pathways.