The prevailing concept that the body's sole source of cellular energy is from the metabolism of foods has been challenged by studies that have identified energy generating materials in virus infected cells. These materials were termed alternative cellular energy pigments. ACE pigments are capable of donating electrons for metabolic reactions and may also generate a type of biophysical force that has yet to be fully understood. ACE pigments generated in stealth virus cultures contain various types of minerals. Both in this regard and in several other shared properties, ACE pigments are comparable to humates. These materials were previously thought to be partial breakdown products of ancient plant materials as they slowly decay towards becoming coal or oil. More recently humates have been viewed as re-synthesized organic materia ls that are rich in aromatic compounds that are bound (coordinated) by different metals. The metals are thought to facilitate the passage of electrons and may also transmit other energies. Humates can both absorb metals from the environment and deliver metals to living cells. They can also function in a buffering-like capacity by reducing the levels of those metals that are in relatively high concentrations within an environment, while at the same time provide those metals for which there is a deficiency. Humates have been extensively used in agriculture and are also available as dietary supplements.

Some parents of autistic children have attributed their child's illness to mercury toxicity. Mercury is included in various vaccines in the form of a preservative called thimerosal. Mercury poisoning can cause neurological damage and conceivably certain children may be uniquely susceptible to its toxic effects. It is unlikely to be the underlying cause of autism, however, since neuropeptide changes are present in cord blood samples of children who subsequently become autistic. Autistic children show lower levels of mercury in hair analyses compared to normal children. This suggests that they may be accumulating mercury, possibly in the formation of ACE pigments. Litigation is underway concerning possible Industry and Government negligence in disregarding the potential toxicity of thimerosal in vaccines. It would be ironic if i ndeed the mercury obtained from the vaccines was actually being used productively by the body in the formation of ACE pigments.

The ingestion of humates and/or the humic and fulvic acids obtained from humates may help provide a substitute for, or at least the building blocks for the formation of ACE pigments. Stealth virus cultures undergo a repair process attributable to ACE pigments. An additional benefit of ingesting humates is the potential capacity to absorb those minerals that may be in abnormally high concentrations. Humates have a high absorptive capacity for mercury and clinical studies documenting the excretion of mercury in patients consuming humates as dietary supplements would be of interest. More important will be a determination of any clinical changes occurring in the patients.

The increasing incidence of autism is consistent with an infectious cause. Stealth-adapted viruses have been regularly cultured from children with autism and related diseases. Several stealth viruses were unequivocally derived from African green monkey simian cytomegalovirus. Infected monkeys were routinely used for the production of live polio virus vaccines. The Food and Drug Administration has confirmed the presence of simian cytomegalovirus DNA in some of the licensed lots of polio vaccines approved for use in the United States . It would be regrettable if unnecessary focusing on thimerosal in vaccines were to delay official efforts to search for infectious agents inadvertently int roduced into humans through vaccines.