How Hydrogen Gas May Heal Cells by Fixing Damaged Energy Centers
- Authors
- Toru Ishibashi
- Journal
- Current Pharmaceutical Design
- Year
- 2019
- DOI
- 10.2174/1381612825666190506123038
- Study Type
- clinical
- Peer Reviewed
- Yes
- Country
- Japan
- Health Condition
- Neurodegenerative Diseases
- Body System
- Cellular
TL;DR
Scientists found that a gas called molecular hydrogen (H2) might help treat diseases like brain problems and inflammation—not just by cleaning up bad stuff in your cells like people thought, but by actually helping your cell's energy factories work better and preventing them from making harmful waste products in the first place.
Key Finding
Molecular hydrogen may work not just as a free radical scavenger, but as an electron and proton donor in mitochondrial complex I, helping regulate electron flow and prevent harmful reactive oxygen species production during cellular stress.
Summary
This review article proposes a new explanation for how molecular hydrogen (H2) might help treat diseases like neurodegeneration and inflammation. Rather than simply neutralizing harmful molecules called free radicals, the authors suggest H2 works by helping mitochondria (the energy-producing parts of cells) manage electron flow more efficiently, particularly when cells are stressed or damaged. This mechanism could explain why H2 has been reported to help with various health conditions.
Practical Takeaway
This is a theoretical review proposing a new mechanism—not a clinical study with human results. While the proposed mechanism is scientifically interesting and may help explain previous findings about H2, it does not provide new evidence that H2 benefits human health. More research, including human trials, would be needed to determine if this mechanism actually occurs in people and whether it translates to real health benefits.
Abstract
Background: Molecular hydrogen (H2) is now recognized as a therapeutic gas for the treatment of numerous diseases including neurodegenerative diseases, metabolic disorders, and inflammatory diseases. Nonpolar, neutral H2 is assumed to have health benefits facilitated by its passive diffusion across the human body immediately after administration and is considered a safe therapeutic inert gas that does not interfere with physiological enzymatic reactions. The effects of H2 on mammalian cells are assumed to be based on non-enzymatic reactions with reactive oxygen species (ROS) exhibiting extremely high reactivity. However, many reports on therapeutic applications of H2 have the limitation to regard H2 only as a scavenger for the hydroxyl radical and peroxynitrite. Methods: Apart from this proposed principle, a new possible mechanism of H2 activation and consumption in mammalian cells is considered in this review, which is specifically focused on the mitochondrial complex I that has a close evolutionary relationship with energy-converting, membrane-bound [NiFe]-hydrogenases (MBH). Notably, the possibility that H2 may function as both electron and proton donor in the ubiquinone-binding chamber of complex I is discussed. Results: H2 is proposed to act as the rectifier of the mitochondrial electron flow in the disordered or pathological state when the accumulation of electrons leads to ROS production, specifically during the re-supply of O2 after hypoxia in the mitochondria. Conclusion: Furthermore, H2 is proposed to convert the quinone intermediates to the fully reduced ubiquinol, thereby increasing the antioxidant capacity of the quinone pool as well as preventing the generation of ROS.