Research from many different disciplines has revealed that electrically conductive contact of the human body with the surface of the Earth (grounding or earthing) produces intriguing effects on physiology and health.
These effects relate to inflammation, immune responses, wound healing, and prevention and treatment of chronic inflammatory, autoimmune diseases, and more.
The main hypothesis is that connecting your body to the Earth enables free electrons from the Earth’s surface to spread over and into the body, where they can have antioxidant effects.
Specifically, it’s suggested that mobile electrons create an antioxidant microenvironment around the injury repair field, slowing or preventing reactive oxygen species (ROS) delivered by the oxidative burst from causing “collateral damage” to healthy tissue, and preventing or reducing the formation of the so-called “inflammatory barricade”.
It’s also hypothesized that electrons from the Earth can prevent or resolve so-called “silent” or “smoldering” inflammation.
This article is going to be incredibly fascinating to those of you who know a lot about grounding and those of you who know nothing about the subject.
It’s a bit dense, so have patience when reading it and take your time to understand everything written here.
Strap in.
Anatomical & Biophysical Aspects For Grounding
Research in cell biology and biophysics shows the human body is equipped with a system-wide collagenous, liquid–crystalline semiconductor network known as the living matrix, or in other words, a ground regulation system.
It’s also called the tissue tensegrity matrix system, but we’ll stick with living matrix for simplicity sake.
This body-wide network can deliver mobile electrons to any part of the body and thereby routinely protect all cells, tissues, and organs from oxidative stress or in the event of injury.
The living matrix includes the extracellular and connective tissue matrices as well as the cytoskeletons of all cells.
Integrins at cell surfaces are thought to allow for semi-conduction of electrons to the cell interior, and links across the nuclear envelope enable the nuclear matrix and genetic material to be part of the circuitry.
The hypothesis is that this body-wide electronic circuit represents a primary antioxidant defense system. You heard that correctly. Grounding and free electrons being a primary player in the antioxidant department.
It’s important to note that the living matrix is a continuous fibrous web-work or network that extends into every part of the body. It’s the largest system in the body, as it’s the only system that touches all of the other systems.
The extracellular components of this network consist primarily of collagen and ground substance. The cytoskeleton is composed of microtubules, microfilaments, and other fibrous proteins. The nuclear matrix contains another protein fabric composed of histones and related materials.
(A) Collagen, the principal protein of the extracellular connective tissue matrix, is a triple helix with a hydration shell surrounding each polypeptide strand. The protein can transfer electrons by semiconduction, and protons (H+) and hydroxyls (OH−) migrate through the hydration shell. These charge movements can be very rapid and are vital to life.
(B) Detail of a matrisome to the right reveals vast stores of electrons. Electrons from the ground substance can migrate through the collagen network to any point in the body.
Biological Semi-Conduction
Even people within this field do not recognize collagen and other structural proteins as semiconductors, yet they would be incorrect.
The concept was introduced by Albert Szent-Györgyi in the Korányi memorial lecture in Budapest, Hungary in 1941. His talk was published in both Science (Towards a New Biochemistry?) and Nature (The Study of Energy Levels in Biochemistry).
The idea that proteins might be semiconductors was firmly rejected by biochemists.
Many modern scientists continue to reject semi-conduction in proteins, because living systems only have trace amounts of silicone, germanium, and compounds of gallium that are the most widely used materials in electronic semiconductor devices.
However, there are many ways of making organic semiconductors without using metals. One of the sources of confusion was the widely held belief that water was a mere filler material. We now know that water plays crucial roles in enzymatic activities and semi-conduction.
Hydrated proteins actually are semiconductors, and have become important components in the global microelectronics industry.
In recent studies, scientists in Israel were given awards by the Materials Research Society in both Europe and the USA because they made flexible biodegradable semiconductor systems using proteins from human blood, milk, and mucus.
We’ve come a long way in our understanding of semi-conduction.
Furthermore, ground substance polyelectrolyte molecules associated with the collagenous connective tissue matrix are charge reservoirs.
The matrix is therefore a vast whole-body redox system and is capable of absorbing and donating electrons wherever they are needed to support immune functioning.
The interiors of cells including the nuclear matrix and DNA are all parts of this biophysical electrical storage and delivery system as well.
What are some of the effects and benefits of this system in relation to grounding?
First, we know from medical infrared imaging that inflammation begins to subside within 30 minutes of connecting with the earth via a conductive patch placed on the skin.
Secondly, metabolic activity increases during this same period. There’d an increase in oxygen consumption, pulse rate, and respiratory rate and a decrease in blood oxygenation during 40 minutes of grounding.
It’s suspected that the “filling” of the charge reservoirs is a gradual process, possibly because of the enormous number of charged residues on the polyelectrolytes, and because they are located throughout the body.
When charge reservoirs are saturated, the body is in a state that’s referred to as “inflammatory preparedness”. This means that the ground substance, which pervades every part of the body, is ready to quickly deliver antioxidant electrons to any site of injury via the semiconducting collagenous matrix.
Below is a comparison of immune response in ungrounded versus grounded person.
(A) After an injury, the ungrounded person (Mr Shoes) will form an inflammatory barricade around the injury site.
(B) After an injury, the grounded person (Mr Barefoot) will not form an inflammatory barricade, because reactive oxygen species that could damage nearby healthy tissue (collateral damage) are immediately neutralized by electrons semiconducted from the electron-saturated ground substance via the collagen network.
We must also consider that grounding is a strong anti-aging strategy since the dominant theory of aging emphasizes cumulative damage caused by ROS produced during normal metabolism or produced in response to pollutants, poisons, or injury.
Electron Deficiency
The inflammatory barricade may be a consequence of lack of grounding and an “electron deficiency”.
Wounds heal very differently when the body is grounded. Healing is much faster and the key signs of inflammation are reduced or eliminated. The profiles of various inflammatory markers over time are very different in grounded individuals.
The disconnection from the Earth is an important and overlooked contribution to physiological dysfunction and to the alarming global rise in chronic disease.
A lack of electrons can also de-saturate the electron transport chains in mitochondria, leading to chronic fatigue and slowing the cellular migrations and other essential activities of the cells of the immune system.
When mobile electrons are not available, the inflammatory process takes an abnormal course. Areas that are electron deficient are vulnerable to further injury – they become positively charged and will have difficulty warding off infections. The result is an immune system constantly activated and eventually exhausted.
This leads to a host of metabolic problems.
With that, any skepticism around grounding can be laid to rest, especially considering the other factors not mentioned in this article.
Much love,
Zaid
Thank you Zaid, this is a very concise and well researched article. Thumbs up! I admire both your passion and your knowledge.