Phiten USA – a new twist around the titanium metal

Phiten USA is all about magnetic-ionic-titanium accessories. The name "Phiten" comes from the Greek letter phi Φ, which symbolizes a perfect balance in the natural world, and the number ten. Thus, the Phiten products aim to create a perfectly balanced flow of energy throughout the body, helping to ease stress and fatigue from daily work or exercise.

The ionized concept was not patented by Phiten. It’s been around since the discovery of the notion of ions. This first arose in chemistry. In the 19th century it was well known that water in which salts were dissolved conducted electricity. Soon after, the chemist Faraday also documented that an electric current could separate such dissolved materials into their components.

Although the facts were clear and the rules for this process were formulated, the chemical mechanism behind it was still uncertain. The answer was given in 1884 by Svante Arrhenius, a Swedish scientist who received the 1903 Nobel Prize for chemistry. Among many other things, he was the first one to suggest the greenhouse effect” theory.

Arrhenius analyzed the classical ionic reaction – dissolving salt table (NaCL – sodium chloride) in water. He proposed that the NaCl molecules break up into electrically charged "ions" (which would be the Greek word for "the ones that move") Na+ and Cl-. Electric forces make Na+ ions move in one direction, Cl- ions in the opposite and this is how the electric current is carried.

Phiten USA, as all other producers that sell ionic – based accessories, say Trion Z, claim that their products are ionically charged. These ions are allegedly emitted on a continuous basis, regulating the electrical field of the human body, thus provoking beneficial health effects.

If you understood what an ion really is, it’s a no brainer to spot the scientific flaws of such an explanation of your phiten necklace of choice. The components of the solid materials that commonly surround as are not ions, but rather molecules – stable formations of two or more atoms. The breaking” of such a molecule in the corresponding electrically charged ions always involves a chemical transformation – dissolving being the simplest and the most common one.

The only substances that “break” spontaneously without requiring any chemical reactions whatsoever are commonly known as radioactive. And, as you may have seen in the movies, it would be a terrible bad idea to stick around them for too long.

Phiten USA seemed to get that public chemical culture has grown in the last decades, and they changed their primary ionic concept used to scientifically fundament their claims. Their using now an explanation based on the more invisible and less studied magnetic field, with an added flavor of nano-sized particles and titanium micro-spheres.

This thing has been called a scam for so many times that I hardly see the need for me to do it again. I’m only interested in the titanium component of it. This was easy, as I’ve discovered and documented elsewhere on this site that there really isn’t too much titanium to talk about. Though dissolving titanium in water does really sound cool – though not too scientific, I must add.

What is Phiten USA has and I’m curios about is its apparent success in the market. If it’s a scam why do people still buy it, and why it is expanding? As far as I know, besides the Phiten headquarters in Torrace, California, there are at least two other major Phiten shops (in Seattle and Honolulu) and countless retailers that offer Phiten tornadoes, bracelets and necklaces to the avid buyer.

The answer is obviously in the marketing campaign. There are too many things attached to the Phiten name for it not to be successful. Worn by the nation best and most loved baseball players, Titanium as a main component and using the latest developments in science – nano-technology and magnetic fields.

I’d have been surprised if it didn’t sell.