Fifty Years of Radical Ideas

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Abstract
My role in the free radical theory of oxygen toxicity is discussed. Rebeca Gerschman and I published several papers on this subject. This sparked my interest in geochemistry and I developed the idea that oxygen was the best qualified biological potential energy source for the following reasons: great abundance, easily accessible, possession of a high thermodynamic potential, and its slow reaction rate. Ionization radiation can be viewed as a catalyst for reactive oxygen species since a killing dose imparts an infinitesimal small amount of energy. Next, Carol A. Colton and I showed that in the mammalian brain that stimulated microglia produce the superoxide radical anion and its implications in Alzheimer's disease is discussed. More recently, I have become interested in the role of sulfhydryl groups in transcription factors.