Antioxidants are types of nutrients in foods that protect the cells in the body from harm that is caused by free radicals. Free radicals are unsteady molecules that cause destruction to the body.
What are "free radicals," exactly? They aren't young, free-thinking activists, for one thing, but that's not too far off either: free radicals are essentially atoms gone rogue. Normally, when atoms split off from a molecule, each one leaves with the correct number of electrons for its size in its outer shell, but when they're missing an electron, they go berserk, "looking" all over the place for an electron to steal.
