GrowTallest

Oxidative stress

What reactive oxygen species do at the growth plate, why the plate needs some of them, and why no antioxidant has been shown to lengthen a mammalian bone.

Inside the plateUpdated

22 min read73 sources

Oxidation at a growth plate as a dial with three settings: too little and cartilage cells stall without maturing, a working range in the middle where they divide and then swell, and too much where they die. Only the middle setting produces the full column of swelling cells that lengthens a bone. Too littlecells stallWorking rangecells matureToo muchcells die

Reactive oxygen species are usually introduced as wear and tear. At the growth plate that is half the story: the cells that make them are arranged in a pattern, and removing them stops cartilage forming.

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