Reducing Toxic Effects of Alcohol
Cysteine has been proposed as a preventative or antidote for some of the negative effects of alcohol, including liver damage and hangover. It counteracts the poisonous effects of acetaldehyde, which is the major by-product of alcohol metabolism and is responsible for most of the negative aftereffects and long-term damage associated with alcohol use (but not the immediate effects of drunkenness). Cysteine supports the next step in metabolism, which turns acetaldehyde into the relatively harmless acetic acid. In a rat study, test animals received an LD50 dose of acetaldehyde (the amount that normally kills half of all animals). Those that received cysteine had an 80% survival rate; when both cysteine and thiamine were administered, all animals survived. There is not yet direct evidence for or against its effectiveness in humans who consume alcohol at normal levels.
Read more about this topic: Cysteine
Famous quotes containing the words reducing, toxic, effects and/or alcohol:
“It is the American vice, the democratic disease which expresses its tyranny by reducing everything unique to the level of the herd.”
—Henry Miller (1891–1980)
“America today is capable of terrific intolerance about smoking, or toxic waste that threatens trout. But only a deeply confused society is more concerned about protecting lungs than minds, trout than black women.”
—Garry Wills (b. 1934)
“Some of the greatest and most lasting effects of genuine oratory have gone forth from secluded lecture desks into the hearts of quiet groups of students.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)
“No power on earth or above the bottomless pit has such influence to terrorize and make cowards of men as the liquor power. Satan could not have fallen on a more potent instrument with which to thrall the world. Alcohol is king!”
—Eliza “Mother” Stewart (1816–c. 1908)