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Bioavailability of calcium from modified carrots expressing a plant Ca2+/H+ transporter
Author(s) -
Morris Jay,
Park Sunghun,
Nakata Paul,
Hirschi Kendal
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.20.4.a196-d
Subject(s) - bioavailability , transporter , calcium , chemistry , food science , pharmacology , biochemistry , biology , gene , organic chemistry
Our long range goal is to make vegetables a better source of dietary calcium. We have modified carrots to express a plant Ca 2+ /H + transporter (termed sCAX1) which leads to two‐fold higher calcium content in the edible portions of the sCAX1 ‐expressing plants. The immediate question becomes whether this increase alters the level of bioavailable calcium? Using a mouse model for estimating calcium bioavailability, our preliminary findings suggest that treatment diets containing sCAX1 carrots extrinsically labeled with 45 Ca have no difference in the percent absorption into the femurs compared to labeled diets containing control carrots. To examine the usefulness of extrinsic labeling techniques, we are in the process of intrinsically labeling sCAX1 and control carrots for mice diet preparation. To determine if these findings have relevance for human nutrition, future work will be done feeding stable isotope labeled sCAX1 carrots to adolescent children. Our preliminary findings suggest that higher concentration of calcium from sCAX1 carrots do not alter calcium absorption in mice. Our initial observations suggest we have created a novel way of fortifying vegetables with bioavailable calcium. This research was funded by a National Institutes of Health grant, number 1R01DK062366.