Re: some plants are brimming with glutathione

[Guest guest]

Holy cow!

So...geez, I can't even decide what I want to say.

That's quite the interesting piece. Turns all kinds of things upside

down.

So, if you can transfer this example into the human realm, it makes

sense that people who are suffering from mercury toxicity (or some

other metal) perhaps wouldn't be if they weren't already sick and

depleted of glutathione to begin with.

I wonder if this applies to chemical sensitivities in general? It

seems so many of us develop MCS as our disease progresses.

Rich, can you referesh us on the relationship of glutathione and

salicylic acid?

penny

>

>

>

http://news.uns.purdue.edu/UNS/html4ever/2005/050311.Salt.pathogens.h

tml

>

> March 11, 2005

>

> Excerpts from press release discussing article in Friday, March 11

> issue of the journal Plant Physiology

>

> Defenseless plants arm themselves with metals

>

> WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – A group of plants that uses metal to defend

> against infection may do so because the normal defense mechanism

used

> by most other plants is blocked.

>

> .....Salt and his colleagues also show in the current study that

> salicylic acid induces production of a molecule called

glutathione, a

> potent antioxidant that protects plants from metal. Because the

> production of glutathione is tied to the production of salicylic

acid,

> most plants normally have fairly low glutathione levels and,

> consequently, can't tolerate metals.

>

> Thlaspi, on the other hand, is brimming with glutathione, thanks

to its

> elevated salicylic acid levels. When grown in nickel-enriched

soil,

> Thlaspi takes up 3 percent of its body weight in the metal. Salt

and

> his colleagues have shown that this metal content is what makes

the

> plants resistant to pathogens.

[Guest guest]

Sue, Penny and the group,

I think this is really interesting stuff! Thanks for posting it.

There's a lot I don't know about plant physiology and plant

biochemistry, but I'll try to interpret this a little.

First off, note that plants and people share a lot of the same

biochemistry, but there are also some very important differences.

Plants have some genes that people don't have, and vice versa.

Therefore, plants make some proteins that people don't, and vice

versa, and their cells have important differences, as do their gross

anatomy and physiology. They use some different biochemical

pathways.

Plants and people do share some of the same enemies, such as toxic

metals, viruses, bacteria and fungi. The biochemical methods they

use to combat these threats have some similarity when it gets down

to the nitty gritty of the chemical reactions involved, but they

have different ways of getting there.

With that as a background, what's going on with salicylic acid and

glutathione in this plant? It has been known for some time that

plants in general generate salicylic acid when they are threatened

in various ways. The pathway for making it starts with the amino

acid phenylalanine, which plants can synthesize from scratch. When

plants raise their level of salicylic acid, this turns on the

expression of some genes, which go on to produce an oxidative attack

against the enemy, much like our immune system cells use. As in our

own bodies, plants need to protect themselves against the resulting

oxidative stress, and they make things like catalase, glutathione

and glutathioe peroxidase to do that.

In most plants, toxic metals are excluded from being absorbed from

the soil. In the plant discussed in this paper, high levels of

nickel are allowed into the plant, which grows in soil high in

nickel. Perhaps the level of nickel is so high there that the plant

is not able to keep it out. Ordinarily, nickel would be toxic,

because it is a transition metal, having more than one oxidation

state, and it therefore will generate oxidizing free radicals via

the Fenton reaction, as too much free iron or copper will do in the

human body. But these researchers have found that in this plant

there is a high level of glutathione, which is protecting it against

the high rate of generation of oxidizing free radicals from the high

nickel content. It appears that the normal pathway that is active

in most plants that would give feedback and downregulate salicylic

acid is not functioning in this plant. Therefore, the salicylic

acid level stays high, and therefore the glutathione level stays

high. This high glutathione level allows the plant to tolerate high

levels of nickel in the plant cells.

I don't think that this is directly applicable to people, except to

note that glutathione is protecting against free radicals in the

plant, as it does in people. In people, glutathione also serves the

function of binding to heavy metals and carrying them out in the

bile, and thence in the stools. I don't think this mechanism

functions in plants, since they don't have the same " hardware " we

do, and they don't go to the bathroom! So I think they just have to

live (or die) with the heavy metals they have imported.

But, getting to the point you raised, Penny, yes, I think you're

right that if people have normal levels of glutathione, and are able

to maintain them, their bodies are able to take out the heavy metals

about as fast as they come in. I think that's why most people can

tolerate having mercury fillings in their teeth. However, if their

ability to keep up their glutathione level fails for some reason,

such as genetic variations that diminish it, or an overwhelming load

of glutathione depletors, or old age, when glutathione production is

found to drop off, then it's a different story. The kids with

autism appear to represent a combination of genetic variations an a

fairly large load of mercury that came in with the shots. People

with Alzheimer's may have an inability to make as much glutathione

as they need to maintain their protection, because of the drop-off

in production with old age. People with CFS may have some genetic

variations, or may have had a big load of glutathione depletors, or

both. I think this remains to be sorted out, and I suspect that it

won't be the same for all PWCs.

Rich

> >

> >

> >

>

http://news.uns.purdue.edu/UNS/html4ever/2005/050311.Salt.pathogens.h

> tml

> >

> > March 11, 2005

> >

> > Excerpts from press release discussing article in Friday, March

11

> > issue of the journal Plant Physiology

> >

> > Defenseless plants arm themselves with metals

> >

> > WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – A group of plants that uses metal to

defend

> > against infection may do so because the normal defense mechanism

> used

> > by most other plants is blocked.

> >

> > .....Salt and his colleagues also show in the current study that

> > salicylic acid induces production of a molecule called

> glutathione, a

> > potent antioxidant that protects plants from metal. Because the

> > production of glutathione is tied to the production of salicylic

> acid,

> > most plants normally have fairly low glutathione levels and,

> > consequently, can't tolerate metals.

> >

> > Thlaspi, on the other hand, is brimming with glutathione, thanks

> to its

> > elevated salicylic acid levels. When grown in nickel-enriched

> soil,

> > Thlaspi takes up 3 percent of its body weight in the metal. Salt

> and

> > his colleagues have shown that this metal content is what makes

> the

> > plants resistant to pathogens.

[Guest guest]

> Sue, Penny and the group,

>

> People with CFS may have some genetic

> variations, or may have had a big load of glutathione depletors, or

> both. I think this remains to be sorted out, and I suspect that it

> won't be the same for all PWCs.

>

> Rich

>

>

Hi Rich,

I was reading a webpage on the cardiac research in CFS that Cort

created, she posted the link on Co-cure recently and maybe this group.

She mentioned that at the AACFS conference they mentioned that the

RNase dysfunction in CFS is causing an inability of Mercury to

detoxify.

So it sounds like even if we have enough glutathione, without the

RNase working properly Mercury won't detoxify.

Any comments?

Al

[Guest guest]

Hi, Al.

I'm not sure that the folks in Belgium have it all figured out right

yet. I'm actually in correspondence periodically with a member of

their group, and we are kicking hypotheses around. My own view is

that both the elevated RNase-L pathway and the problem with mercury

detox have a common cause, which is glutathione depletion.

Incidentally, Cort is a " he " rather than a " she. " I wasn't sure

about this myself for the longest time, until he said something

to " tip his hand " some time back. Also, if you check out his webpage

(cfs-phoenix), you'll see in the fine print on the first page that

his middle name is " . "

Rich

> Hi Rich,

>

> I was reading a webpage on the cardiac research in CFS that

Cort

> created, she posted the link on Co-cure recently and maybe this

group.

> She mentioned that at the AACFS conference they mentioned that the

> RNase dysfunction in CFS is causing an inability of Mercury to

> detoxify.

> So it sounds like even if we have enough glutathione, without the

> RNase working properly Mercury won't detoxify.

>

> Any comments?

>

> Al