The Problem of Vitamin D Scarcity: Cultural and Genetic Solutions by Indigenous Arctic and Tropical Peoples
Vitamin D metabolism differs among human populations because our species has adapted to different natural and cultural environments. Two environments are particularly difficult for the production of vitamin D by the skin: the Arctic, where the skin receives little solar UVB over the year; and the Tr...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:9573337 2023-05-15T14:52:31+02:00 The Problem of Vitamin D Scarcity: Cultural and Genetic Solutions by Indigenous Arctic and Tropical Peoples Frost, Peter 2022-09-30 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9573337/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36235726 https://doi.org/10.3390/nu14194071 en eng MDPI http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9573337/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36235726 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu14194071 © 2022 by the author. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). CC-BY Nutrients Review Text 2022 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.3390/nu14194071 2022-10-23T00:57:03Z Vitamin D metabolism differs among human populations because our species has adapted to different natural and cultural environments. Two environments are particularly difficult for the production of vitamin D by the skin: the Arctic, where the skin receives little solar UVB over the year; and the Tropics, where the skin is highly melanized and blocks UVB. In both cases, natural selection has favored the survival of those individuals who use vitamin D more efficiently or have some kind of workaround that ensures sufficient uptake of calcium and other essential minerals from food passing through the intestines. Vitamin D scarcity has either cultural or genetic solutions. Cultural solutions include consumption of meat in a raw or boiled state and extended breastfeeding of children. Genetic solutions include higher uptake of calcium from the intestines, higher rate of conversion of vitamin D to its most active form, stronger binding of vitamin D to carrier proteins in the bloodstream, and greater use of alternative metabolic pathways for calcium uptake. Because their bodies use vitamin D more sparingly, indigenous Arctic and Tropical peoples can be misdiagnosed with vitamin D deficiency and wrongly prescribed dietary supplements that may push their vitamin D level over the threshold of toxicity. Text Arctic PubMed Central (PMC) Arctic Nutrients 14 19 4071 |
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Review Frost, Peter The Problem of Vitamin D Scarcity: Cultural and Genetic Solutions by Indigenous Arctic and Tropical Peoples |
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Vitamin D metabolism differs among human populations because our species has adapted to different natural and cultural environments. Two environments are particularly difficult for the production of vitamin D by the skin: the Arctic, where the skin receives little solar UVB over the year; and the Tropics, where the skin is highly melanized and blocks UVB. In both cases, natural selection has favored the survival of those individuals who use vitamin D more efficiently or have some kind of workaround that ensures sufficient uptake of calcium and other essential minerals from food passing through the intestines. Vitamin D scarcity has either cultural or genetic solutions. Cultural solutions include consumption of meat in a raw or boiled state and extended breastfeeding of children. Genetic solutions include higher uptake of calcium from the intestines, higher rate of conversion of vitamin D to its most active form, stronger binding of vitamin D to carrier proteins in the bloodstream, and greater use of alternative metabolic pathways for calcium uptake. Because their bodies use vitamin D more sparingly, indigenous Arctic and Tropical peoples can be misdiagnosed with vitamin D deficiency and wrongly prescribed dietary supplements that may push their vitamin D level over the threshold of toxicity. |
format |
Text |
author |
Frost, Peter |
author_facet |
Frost, Peter |
author_sort |
Frost, Peter |
title |
The Problem of Vitamin D Scarcity: Cultural and Genetic Solutions by Indigenous Arctic and Tropical Peoples |
title_short |
The Problem of Vitamin D Scarcity: Cultural and Genetic Solutions by Indigenous Arctic and Tropical Peoples |
title_full |
The Problem of Vitamin D Scarcity: Cultural and Genetic Solutions by Indigenous Arctic and Tropical Peoples |
title_fullStr |
The Problem of Vitamin D Scarcity: Cultural and Genetic Solutions by Indigenous Arctic and Tropical Peoples |
title_full_unstemmed |
The Problem of Vitamin D Scarcity: Cultural and Genetic Solutions by Indigenous Arctic and Tropical Peoples |
title_sort |
problem of vitamin d scarcity: cultural and genetic solutions by indigenous arctic and tropical peoples |
publisher |
MDPI |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9573337/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36235726 https://doi.org/10.3390/nu14194071 |
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Arctic |
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Arctic |
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Arctic |
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Arctic |
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Nutrients |
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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9573337/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36235726 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu14194071 |
op_rights |
© 2022 by the author. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
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CC-BY |
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https://doi.org/10.3390/nu14194071 |
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Nutrients |
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