While the study's principal investigator, Dr. Ishwarlal Jialal, assistant professor of clinical nutrition and internal medicine, isn't ready to make a wholesale recommendation for vitamin mega dosing, human trials are under way in the Center, and results should be ready in about a year. What we don't know is how cholesterol builds up in the artery wall and causes atherosclerosis. LDL transports 60 to 70 percent of the cholesterol in the blood, he explained. The higher the level of LDL, the greater the risk of coronary heart disease. Once LDL is inside the artery, it can be oxidized by cells that produce reactive oxygen.
Oxidation can alter or destroy substances found in food and important in the body.
It is the same process that causes some oils to turn rancid when exposed to air. Vitamins C and E, because they can be oxidized themselves, act as bodyguards of oxidizable substances, sacrificing themselves to save another life. Chemists call such bodyguards antioxidants. What we wanted to do with this research was look at the effect of antioxidant vitamins on the process. Nobody had looked at the effect of vitamin C on LDL oxidation.