The Department of Biology at the College of Education for Pure Sciences (Ibn Al-Haitham) at the University of Baghdad has organized a workshop entitled “Antioxidants and their role in curbing free radicals” delivered by a number of professors at the department. The workshop aimed to provide participants with information about antioxidants and their role in suppressing free radicals and getting antioxidants in daily food.
The workshop began by introducing the participants to antioxidants as being chemical compounds with important biological properties for living organisms, such as their contribution to protection from diseases of aging, heart and atherosclerosis, and they also have an important role in maintaining the safety of the individual, especially in the advanced age stages. Antioxidants are classified into enzymatic and non-enzymatic antioxidants, where free radicals are any molecular species capable of independent existence that contains an unpaired electron in an atomic orbital and so some scientists call the term oxidizing agent for the free radical, and where the reasons for an increase of free radicals are food additives, methods of preparing food, pesticides, pollution and smoking.