Magnetite produced by traffic as a possible cause of Alzheimer disease

A rather unexpected partial explanation for Alzheimer's disease has been found: magnetite particles, which can be found in urban environments from exhaust gases containing breathing air (see this). I have written earlier about Alzheimer's disease from the TGD point of view (see this). Magnetite particles seem to be found in the hippocampus of those with the disease, which is central to memory. Now it has been found that the exposure of mice to magnetite leads to a generation of Alzheimer disease. The overall important message to the decision makers is that the pollution caused by the traffic in urban environment could be an important cause of Alzheimer disease.

The brain needs metabolic energy. Hemoglobin is central to the supply of metabolic energy because it binds oxygen. Could it be thought that Alzheimer's is at least partially related to a lack of metabolic energy in the hippocampus? In the sequel I will consider this explanation in the TGD framework.

Short digression to TGD view of metabolism

Oxygen molecules O₂ bind to iron atoms in hemoglobin (see this) that already have a valence bond with 5 nitrogen atoms and a bond is created where Fe has received 5 electrons and a sixth from oxygen molecule O₂. So Fe behaves the opposite of what you would expect and hemoglobin is very unusual chemically!

Phosphate O=PO₃, or more precisely phosphate ion O=P(O_-)³), which also plays a central role in metabolism, also breaks the rules: instead of accepting 3 valence electrons, it gives up 5 electrons to oxygen atoms.

Could the TGD view of quantum biology help to understand what is involved. Dark protons created by the Pollack effect provide a basic control tool of quantum biochemistry in TGD. Could they be involved now. Consider first the so-called high energy phosphate bond, which is one of the mysteries of biochemistry.

1. Why the electrons in the valence bonds prefer to be close to P in the phosphate ion? For phosphate one would expect just the opposite. The negative charge of 3 oxygens could explain why electrons tend to be nearer to P.
2. The TGD based view of metabolism allows to consider a new physics explanation in which O=P(O^-)₃ is actually a "dark" variant of neutral O=P(OH)₃ in which 3 protons of OH have become dark (in the TGD sense) by Pollack effect, which has kicked 3 protons to monopole flux tubes of the gravitational magnetic body of phosphate to such a large distance that the resulting dark OH looks like OH^-, that is negatively charged. Charge separation between the biological body and magnetic body would have occurred. This requires metabolic energy basically provided by the solar radiation. One could see the dark phosphate as a temporary metabolic energy storage and the energy would be liberated when ATP transforms to ADP.

Could this kind of model apply also to the Fe binding with 5 N atoms in haemoglobin by valence bonds such that, contrary to naive expectations, electrons tend to be closer to Fe than N atoms? Can one imagine a mechanism giving an effective negative charge to the N atoms or the heme protein and to O-O?

1. In this case there are no protons as in the case of phosphate ions. The water environment however contains protons and pH as a negative logarithm of the proton concentration measures their concentration. pH=7 corresponds to pure water in which H⁺ and OH^- concentrations are the same. The hint comes from the fact that small pH, which corresponds to a high proton concentration, is known to be favourable for the binding of oxygen to the heme group.
2. Could dark protons be involved and what is the relationship between dark proton fraction and pH? Could pH measure the concentration of dark protons as I have asked?
3. Could the transformation of ordinary protons to dark protons at the gravitational MB of the heme protein induce a negative charge due to OH^- ions associated with the heme protein and could this favour the transfer of electrons towards Fe? Could the second O of O-O form a hydrogen bond with H such that the proton of the hydrogen bond becomes dark and makes O effectively negatively charged?

What the effect of magnetite could be?

Magnetite particles, .5 micrometers in size, consist of Fe₃O₄ molecules containing iron and oxygen. According to Wikipedia, magnetite appears as crystals and obeys the chemical formula Fe²⁺(Fe³⁺)₂(O^-2)₄. The electronic configuration is [Ar] 3d⁶ 4s² and 3 Fe ions have donated besides the s electrons also one electron to oxygen.

Could it happen that somehow the oxygen absorption capacity of hemoglobin would decrease, that the amount of hemoglobin would decrease, or that oxygen would bind to the magnetite molecules on the surface of the magnetite particle? For example, could you think that some of the O₂ molecules bind to Fe₃O₄ molecules instead of hemoglobin at the surface of the magnetite. Carbon monoxide is dangerous because it binds to the heme. Could it be that also the magnetite crystals do the same or rather could heme bind to them (thanks for Shamoon Ahmed for proposing this more reasonable looking option).

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.