Below you will find descriptions and links for articles related in general to hydrogen rich water. For articles related to the brain and nervous system, metabolism and diabetes, kidneys, or other body systems, please click on the page links on the right side of this page.
Hydrogen acts as a therapeutic antioxidant by selectively reducing cytotoxic oxygen radicals
This was the breakthrough paper that first introduced the antioxidant potential of molecular hydrogen to the scientific community. The "oxygen radicals" referred to in the title are free radicals or reactive oxygen species (ROS). Not all oxygen radicals are "cytotoxic" (harmful to cells.) While the strongest oxidants, hydroxyl radicals are dangerous, other ROS must be left alone to do their work in the body. This study shows how hydrogen protects cells by neutralizing hydroxyl radicals, while leaving other ROS alone to fulfill their necessary physiological roles.
Hydrogen has another advantage over other antioxidants because it is such a tiny molecule: it is able to penetrate cell membranes, and can easily enter deep into cell components, such as mitochondria and the nucleus, where other antioxidants are not able to reach.
Download this article from Nature Medicine (Ohsawa et al 2007)
Hydrogen Medicine Therapy: An Effective and Promising Novel Treatment for Multiple Organ Dysfunction Syndrome (MODS) Induced by Influenza and Other Viral Infections Disease
This article goes into detail about what damage in done during pandemic type viral infections. Further that the majority of viral -induced tissue damage and discomfort are mainly caused by an inflammatory cytokine storm and oxidative stress rather than by virus itself . That suppressing the cytokine storm and reducing oxidative stress can significantly alleviate the symptoms of influenza and other severe viral infections diseases. It then relates research on how hydrogen can act to protect the body from damage and that hydrogen-rich solution therapy may be a safe, reliable, and effective treatment for Multiple Organ Dysfunction Syndrome (MODS) induced by influenza and other viral infectious diseases. Download this article from SOJ Microbiology & Infectious Diseases (2017)
Molecular Hydrogen as an Emerging Therapeutic Medical Gas for Neurodegenerative and Other Diseases
The effects of molecular hydrogen on various diseases have been documented for 63 disease models and human diseases (at the time this article was written.) Most studies have been performed on rats and mice, however the lack of any adverse effects of hydrogen have enabled clinical studies in humans even in the absence of animal studies. Important effects of hydrogen are observed especially in diseases caused by oxidative stress including
- Neonatal cerebral hypoxia (reduced supply of oxygen to the brain at birth)
- Parkinson's disease
- Ischemia/reperfusion of spinal cord, heart, lung, liver, kidney, and intestine (ischemia is the restriction of blood supply to tissue, reperfusion is the damage caused when blood supply returns to the tissue after a period of ischemia)
- Transplantation of lung, heart, kidney, and intestine
Six human diseases have been studied to date:
- Diabetes mellitus type 2
- Metabolic syndrome
- Hemodialysis (treatment for kidney disease)
- Inflammatory and mitochondrial myopathies (muscle disease)
- Brain stem infarction (stroke of the brain stem)
- Radiation-induced adverse effects (due to radiation therapy for tumors)
Two enigmas remain to be solved. First no dose-response effect is observed. Rodents and humans are able to take a small amount of hydrogen by drinking hydrogen-rich water, but marked effects are observed. Second, intestinal bacteria in humans and rodents produce a large amount of hydrogen, but an addition of a small amount of hydrogen exhibits marked effects. Further studies are required to explain the molecular mechanisms of hydrogen effects and to determine the optimal frequency, amount, and method of hydrogen administration for each human disease.
Download this article from Oxidative Medicine and Cellular Longevity (Ohno et al 2012)
Recent Progress Toward Hydrogen Medicine: Potential of Molecular Hydrogen for Preventive and Therapeutic Applications
Persistent oxidative stress is one of the major causes of most lifestyle-related diseases, cancer and the aging process. Acute oxidative stress directly causes serious damage to tissues. Despite the clinical importance of oxidative damage, antioxidants have been of limited therapeutic success. Molecular hydrogen has potential as a novel antioxidant in preventative and therapeutic applications. Hydrogen has a number of advantages as a potential antioxidant: it rapidly diffuses into tissues and cells, and it is mild enough neither to disturb metabolic redox reactions nor to affect reactive oxygen species (ROS) that function in cell signaling, thereby, there should be little adverse effects of consuming hydrogen. Hydrogen shows not only effects against oxidative stress, but also various anti-inflammatory and anti-allergic effects.
Download this article from Current Pharmaceutical Design (Ohta 2011)
Recent advances in hydrogen research as a therapeutic medical gas
Recent research has revealed that hydrogen is an important factor in the regulation of physiology. It has protective effects on cells and organs including antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and anti-apoptotic (protective against cell death) effects. Therapeutic hydrogen has been applied by different delivery methods including straight-forward inhalation, drinking hydrogen dissolved in water, and injection with hydrogen saturated saline. This review summarizes currently available data regarding the protective role of hydrogen, provides an outline of recent advances in research on the use of hydrogen as a therapeutic medical gas in diverse models of disease and discusses the feasibility of hydrogen as a therapeutic strategy. It is not an overstatement to say that hydrogen’s impact on therapeutic and preventive medicine could be enormous in the future.
Download this article from Free Radical Research (Huang et al 2010)
Hydrogen as a Selective Antioxidant: a Review of Clinical and Experimental Studies
Oxidative stress is implicated in the development of many diseases; however, currently used antioxidants have high toxicity. This means they can only be taken in small amounts which limits their therapeutic effectiveness. There is a clear need for more effective and safer antioxidants. Recently, many studies have reported that molecular hydrogen (inhaled or taken as hydrogen-rich water) can exert beneficial effects in animal models of human diseases. Promising results have also been obtained in clinical studies with humans. These studies suggest that hydrogen has selective antioxidant properties, and can also protect against inflammation, allergies and cell death. This review summaries recent research findings and mechanisms concerning the therapeutic potential of hydrogen.
Download this article from The Journal of International Medical Research (Hong et al 2010)
A hypothesis on chemical mechanism of the effect of hydrogen
Many studies have shown that hydrogen can an play important role in antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and other protective effects. It has been shown that hydrogen can selectively scavenge hydroxyl radicals, however the mechanisms of other recent experimental results have not been explained. This article presents the hypothesis that hydrogen may act as a ligand by binding to metal ions in some proteins, thus regulating the metabolism of ROS and signal transduction. It's important to note that no study was done to test this hypothesis. The article merely presents the possible mechanism and suggests further study.
Download this article from Medical Gas Research (Shi et al 2012)
The 2011 Medical Molecular Hydrogen Symposium: An inaugural symposium of the journal Medical Gas Research
Meetings were held in Japan in 2009, 2010, and 2011 to provide the opportunity for scientists and doctors researching the medical uses of molecular hydrogen to share their rapid scientific progress. At the 2011 symposium, a new peer-reviewed journal was launched, Medical Gas Research, to promote and exchange the dissemination of the latest scientific findings in this area. This article lists the topics discussed by speakers at the symposium, as well as the 38 diseases and physiological states for which hydrogen effects are reported.
Download this article from Medical Gas Research (Ohta et al 2011)
