Jack Threads is the online shopping destination for dudes. Everything on the side is up to eight off. All styles are curated, so buyer's remorse just doesn't happen. What's more is if you were brain stuff, you can skip the membership wait list and get instant access at jack threads dot com slash stuff. Welcome to brain staff from house stuff works dot com where smart happens. Hi, I'm Marshall Brain with today's question, why do they add iodine to
table salt? I have a box of salt in the kitchen and it says iodizes salt, and then at the bottom it says this salt supplies iodine and necessary nutrient On the ingredient label at lists potassium iodine at a concentration of zero point zero zero six percent. A quarter chea spoon of salt or one point five grams therefore provides sixty seven micrograms of iodine, which is out half of the US recommended daily allowance for iodine. The main reason that you need iodine is because of a gland
in your neck called the thyroid gland. The thyroid gland produces two hormones, thyroxine and tri iodo thyroneine that your body uses during metabolism. Without these hormones, you start to feel tired, depressed, cold, weak, and so on. Iodine is an important element in these two hormones, so without iodine, your thyroid gland can't produce them. When start for iodine, the thyroid gland also swells up, and when it does it's called a goiter. Groiters can look pretty hideous. Your
body doesn't need or contain very much iodine. You might have twenty or twenty five milligrams of iodine in your entire body right now. However, in some parts of the world, the soil contains no iodine at all, so plants contain no iodine, and therefore iodine deficitiency is a big problem. In the US, one part of the country that lacks iodine is the Great Lakes region, So companies started adding iodine to salt in the nineteen twenties to eliminate goiter
and thyroid problems. If you live through the Cold War, you may have heard about the practice of taking iodine pills during the threat of a nuclear attack. When a nuclear bomb explodes, one substance it forms is radioactive iodine. If you eat drink or inhale this isotope. Your thyroid gland will concentrate it, and this can lead to a thyroid damage or cancer. By taking an iodine pill, you saturate your thyroid gland with iodine and prevent it from
absorbing any of the radioactive iodine. For more on this and thousands of other topics. Because it how stuff works, dot com Jack Dreads is the online shopping destination for dudes. Every being on the side is up to eighty percent off. All styles are curated, so buyer's remorse just doesn't happen. What's more is if you were brain stuff, you can skip the membership wait list and get instant access at Jack Thread's dot com slash stuff