Page 25 - Summer 2017 Journal

be taken to decrease the risk of cardiovascular disease. Consuming a strictly organic diet that is rich in sulfur-containing foods and spending significant time outdoors without sunscreen on sunny days (exposing both the skin and the eyes to the sun) are two important lifestyle changes. Conversely, the unifying theory suggests that sun avoidance and consumption of chemical- and glyphosate-laden processed foods are likely to be major contributors to the development of coronary atherosclerosis.
One would expect sulfur-rich soil and water derived from basalt rock to be cardioprotective. People living on islands enriched with sulfur- containing volcanic basalt rock (such as Japan, Iceland and Crete) enjoy a low risk of heart at- tacks as well as extended life expectancy. For those not living in such locations, many sulfur- containing compounds have been shown to benefit cardiovascular health, and a broad range of biologically active molecules—recognized as being cardioprotective—have in common that they supply sulfur to the body (Table 1, page 23).
THE BODY ELECTRIC
The topic of electricity in the body is beyond
the scope of this article, but I want to leave you with an image of a solar-powered electrical circuit connecting all parts of the body, where the “wires” are the blood vessels. As noted, the biosulfates in the glycocalyx play an essential role in maintaining an “exclusion zone” of gelled water lining all the vessel walls, within which electrons are mobilized in the gel and protons at the interface to produce electrical current that powers the muscles and neurons.96-98 Thus, cholesterol sulfate captures sunlight energy in the bound sulfate anion to fuel both mobility and neuronal signaling, just as chlorophyll endows plants with the ability to convert sunlight energy into stored sugars, starches and fats. Life on the earth’s surface has always had access to sunlight as an energy source, and animals and plants have found distinct ways to utilize it.
Animals use sunlight to oxidize oxygen to superoxide which then oxidizes sulfur to sulfate. Cholesterol is the carrier molecule that distrib- utes the sulfate over the vasculature. Cholesterol, too, is oxidized by sunlight to form vitamin D, a signaling molecule that communicates to the
SUMMER 2017
tissues that “all is well.” As the negatively charged red blood cells traverse the capillaries, they create a dynamic electromagnetic signal called the “streaming potential” that oscillates with the rhythm of the heartbeat. Endothelial cells respond to this signal by releasing nitric oxide, which relaxes the vessels and promotes flow.99
Cholesterol sulfate is an important source of sulfate to maintain the red blood cells’ negative surface charge and to populate the extracellular matrix of the endothelial wall. This results in near frictionless trafficking of red blood cells through capillaries.
CONCLUSION
Although the processes that take place in atherosclerotic regions of
major arteries in the heart are complex, they can easily be explained as a mechanism to assure that the heart receives desperately needed cholesterol sulfate supplies. If eNOS were working properly to produce cholesterol sulfate, and the sulfate carriers that are supposed to be produced in the gut were working properly (derived from the aromatic amino acids com- ing out of the shikimate pathway that glyphosate disrupts), sulfate would already be well supplied and there would be no need for inflammatory back-up mechanisms to make sulfate “on the spot.”
I maintain that the modern lifestyle of sun avoidance and exposure to toxic chemicals through food, sunscreen or other environmental insults results in impaired cholesterol sulfate synthesis in the skin mediated by sunlight. The resulting pathology—severe sulfate deficiency—necessitates an alternative last-ditch mechanism for cholesterol sulfate synthesis. Thus, cholesterol gets stored in the artery wall to be made readily available for cholesterol sulfate synthesis whenever precursor sulfur sources such as homocysteine or cysteinylglycine are available, along with superoxide and ATP as sources of oxygen and energy to fuel the reaction. In an emergency, a heart attack also can initiate a programmed response that depletes taurine reserves to restore sulfate supplies. In addition, microbes such as C. pneumoniae can assist in replenishing heparan sulfate to the artery wall. It is no surprise that as statin therapy has interfered with even these less-optimal forms of cholesterol sulfate production, the risk of heart failure has increased, becoming a major contributor to hospitalization, rising health care costs and mortality.
Dr. Stephanie Seneff is a senior research scientist at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory in Cambridge, Massachu- setts. She has a BS degree from MIT in biology and a PhD from MIT in electrical engineering and computer science. Her recent interests have focused on the role of toxic chemicals and micronutrient deficiencies in health and disease, with a special emphasis on the pervasive herbicide Roundup and the mineral sulfur. She has authored over thirty peer- reviewed journal papers in recent years on these topics.
REFERENCES
1. Mann GV. Effects of sulfur compounds on hypercholesteremia and growth in cysteine-
deficient monkeys. Am J Clin Nutr 1960;8:491-8.
2. Morrison LM, Bajwa GS, Alfin-Slater RB, Ershoff BH. Prevention of vascular lesions by
Wise Traditions 25