The mechanism of the enhanced antioxidant effects against superoxide anion radicals of reduced water produced by electrolysis

We reported that reduced water produced by electrolysis enhanced the antioxidant effects of proton donors such as ascorbic acid (AsA) in a previous paper.We also demonstrated that reduced water produced by electrolysis of 2 mM NaCl solutions did not show antioxidant effects by itself.We reasoned that the enhancement of antioxidant effects may be due to the increase of the ionic product of water as solvent.The ionic product of water (pK ) was estimated w by measurements of pH and by a neutralization titration method.As an indicator of oxidative damage, Reactive Oxygen Species- (ROS) mediated DNA strand breaks were measured by the conversion of supercoiled fX-174 RF I double-strand DNA to open and linear forms.Reduced water had a tendency to suppress single-strand breakage of DNA induced by reactive oxygen species produced by H O yCu (II) and HQyCu (II) systems.The enhancement of 22 superoxide anion radical dismutation activity can be explained by changes in the ionic product of water in the reduced water.