Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Bendich, Adrianne
• Gabriel, Edda
• Machlin, Lawrence J.

Titel

Dietary Vitamin E Requirement for Optimum Immune Responses in the Rat

Ist Teil von

• The Journal of nutrition, 1986-04, Vol.116 (4), p.675-681

Ort / Verlag

Bethesda, MD: Elsevier Inc

Erscheinungsjahr

1986

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

MEDLINE

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Supplementation of diets with vitamin E has been shown to enhance immune responses in numerous animal models. However, these experiments have not investigated the dietary requirement of vitamin E for optimal T- and B-lymphocyte mitogen responses and compared this directly with the requirement for growth, maintenance of spleen-body weight ratios, platelet count as well as prevention of myopathy and red blood cell lysis. We have found that male weanling rats maintain normal rate of growth and spleen-body weight ratio when fed purified diets containing 7.5 mg/kg vitamin E. A level of 15 mg/kg was adequate to prevent myopathy, and 50 mg/kg was necessary for the prevention of red blood cell hemolysis. The dietary requirement for optimum T- and B-lymphocyte responses to mitogens was greater than 50 mg/kg and was significantly correlated with plasma vitamin E levels over a range of 0.04–18 µg/ml. Thus, the requirement for this index of immune system activity was higher than for the other functional parameters of vitamin E adequacy measured. Therefore, the immune system responds to changes in dietary vitamin E well before there are signs of frank vitamin deficiency.