Colours brighten up the world and there is a great diversity of colour in plants. The green colour of chlorophyll is an example. The red, purple and blue hues of the flavonoid anthocyanins; and the yellow and pink colours of carotenoids.

Astaxanthin (AX) is a carotenoid pigment that occurs in a variety of sea creatures such as trout, microalgae, yeast, and shrimp. It imparts the bright colours of orange-to-red to the shells of crabs and shrimps, and pink colour to the salmon. It has been gaining attention in recent years due to its varied biological and physiological activities. Its power as an antioxidant is incomparable, and it gobbles up free radicals like the eponymous Pac-Man eating up all the dots in a maze.While other antioxidants offer similar health benefits to the human body, none come close to the effectiveness of AX which is 6,000x stronger than Vitamin C, 800x stronger than CoQ10, and 100x stronger than Vitamin E. In short it is unrivalled as an antioxidant and scavenges the body constantly for free radicals to quench on.

One of the most important physiological activities of AX, which is strongly associated with its antioxidant activity, is its anti-inflammatory activity. In two recent studies researchers found that AX could play a key role in preventing COVID-19 from progressing into fatal or chronic conditions. The research suggests that AX, which acts as a powerful anti-inflammatory and protective agent for organs, could prevent COVID-19 from progressing into cytokine storm (an inflammatory condition in which the body’s immune system starts to attack its own cells).It has good effects on the skin (for smoothness and to prevent wrinkles). An interesting fact about AX is that, as an antioxidant, it was used by Fujifilm to keep the colour fading from negatives and photos. When photo film became a sunset industry, the CEO of Fujifilm decided to pivot to cosmetics. A new company, Astalift, was formed, using its Astaxanthin technology. Now it is a successful supplier of women’s facial products! Apart from smoothening wrinkles, it also gets rid of acne.

In addition, separate from its anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory activities, it has a direct positive effect on mitochondria in cells (the “powerhouse” of cells) as a regulator of its metabolic activities.