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The Iodine Group | |
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Masterjohn
The Activator X TestMasterjohn C Wise Traditions, Spring 2007, pp 16-17.
"The chemical test that Price eventually came to use for the quantification of Activator X in foods was originally suggested as an indirect test for vitamin D by Lester Yoder of the Agricultural Experiment Station of Iowa State College in 1926. The basic principle of the test, called iodometric determination, was most commonly utilized in the United States for detecting the presence of organic peroxides. Since peroxides are capable of oxidizing ionic iodide to diatomic iodine, researchers can detect them by combining the test substance with hydriodic acid and a starch indicator. Hydriodic acid releases iodide ions into a solution. If peroxides are present, they convert these iodide ions to diatomic iodine, which then turns the starch blue or purple."
"Yoder suggested, however, that there was a general correlation between the ability of an oil to peroxidize (become rancid) and its vitamin D content, and advocated testing an oil’s ability to oxidize iodide as an indirect indicator of its level of vitamin D. Having no other convenient chemical test, Price adopted this as his test for vitamin D."
"As Price used this test on over 20,000 samples of dairy foods sent to him from around the world, he realized that the physiological effects that correlated with a food’s ranking were different from those attributable to isolated vitamin D, and began using the term “Activator X” to describe the nutritional substance that the test was measuring."
"While researchers who published in English language journals traditionally used this test to detect peroxides, researchers publishing in Russian and German language journals had been using it to detect the synthetic compound benzoquinone all along. Benzoquinone belongs to a class of chemicals called quinones that includes biological molecules such as coenzyme Q-10 and the K vitamins. These quinones possess oxygen-containing ring structures whose oxygens will steal electrons and hydrogen ions from hydriodic acid and thereby oxidize ionic iodide to diatomic iodine, causing the starch to become a bluish purple color."
"In the 1970s, researchers from Britain and Denmark were debating whether or not healthy rat tissues contained lipid peroxides. The British researchers used the iodometric method to determine peroxide levels and argued that healthy rat tissues did contain peroxides, while the Danish researchers used a different method and argued that they did not. In a 1972 paper published in the British Journal of Nutrition, the Danish researchers demonstrated that the iodometric method was not showing the existence of peroxides in the rat tissues, but rather the existence of coenzyme Q-10 and probably other quinones."
"Price’s test, therefore, was not specific to any one particular chemical compound. When used for fresh oils, however, it would be able to detect a number of nutrients that include coenzyme Q-10 and the K vitamins."
"Either K vitamin would be expected to react with hydriodic acid (HI) by absorbing hydrogen atoms and liberating diatomic iodine (I2)."
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