Re: Detoxifying acetaldahyde

Strictly speaking, chelation therapy is the intravenous administration of chelating agents such as EDTA (ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid) to remove "heavy metals" from the body. There are controversial applications of this technique for other diseases as well with widely differing opinions on the efficacy of such treatments.

EDTA works by sequestering a (positive) cation such as lead within an electronegative net so that it is unable to interact with sites in the body that are vulnerable to attack by the heavy metal.





Heavy metal ions are miniscule in size. One picometer (pm) is one trillionth (1/1,000,000,000,000) of a meter.

Atomic Radius (pm) of Heavy Metals

119 Arsenic (As)
143 Aluminum (Al)
151 Mercury (Hg)
151 Cadmium (Cd)
175 Lead (Pb)

Consider for a moment the acetaldehyde being released by the budding phase of Candida Albicans metabolism (Truss, 1984). This is an organic (carbon,oxygen,hydrogen) molecule but also tiny in comparison to most biological molecular configurations. Spectral data observations place the molecular radius of acetaldehyde somewhere in the 184-237 pm range. These values place the acetaldehyde molecule in the same size range as the heavy metal ions listed above.

Carbonyl (C=O) groups are electrophilic (negative-seeking) because of the electron density shift towards the oxygen atom. This makes the carbonyl carbon of acetaldehyde highly reactive towards nucleophilic (positive-seeking) structures. In essence acetaldehyde is a "pseudo-heavy-metal" with similar deleterious consequences to human physiology.

Does this imply that acetaldehyde would also be chelated by the electronegative EDTA net shown above just as if it were a heavy metal? If so, this would reduce the impact of acetaldehyde (an immunosuppressive, carcinogenic, neurotoxin) and possibly explain the amelioration of symptoms in diseases where actual heavy metals had not been found in excess. In fact, there are industrial applications where EDTA is used in this manner as a countermeasure to acetaldehyde contamination (US patent 4357461 -- reduction of acetaldehyde generation during polyester production by the addition of EDTA).

If acetaldehyde is the culprit and yeast is its source, is intravenous EDTA chelation the best technique for accomplishing the task of capturing it? Not necessarily, given that the primary source of acetaldehyde emission is likely in the gut. Allowing acetaldehyde to migrate into the bloodstream gives it more than ample opportunity to be transported throughout the body before it might come into contact with an intravenous chelating agent.

A more effective strategy would be first, to lower the levels of acetaldehyde exposure by reducing yeast levels capable of producing it and second, to intercept it in the gut before it has had a chance to enter the bloodstream.

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