Laboratory of Plant Biochemistry and Food Sciences - Università Campus Bio-Medico Rome, Italy.
Front Plant Sci. 2013 May 22;4:152. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2013.00152. eCollection 2013.
Vitamin C participates in several physiological processes, among others, immune stimulation, synthesis of collagen, hormones, neurotransmitters, and iron absorption. Severe deficiency leads to scurvy, whereas a limited vitamin C intake causes general symptoms, such as increased susceptibility to infections, fatigue, insomnia, and weight loss. Surprisingly vitamin C deficiencies are spread in both developing and developed countries, with the latter actually trying to overcome this lack through dietary supplements and food fortification. Therefore new strategies aimed to increase vitamin C in food plants would be of interest to improve human health. Interestingly, plants are not only living bioreactors for vitamin C production in optimal growing conditions, but also they can increase their vitamin C content as consequence of stress conditions. An overview of the different approaches aimed at increasing vitamin C level in plant food is given. They include genotype selection by "classical" breeding, bio-engineering and changes of the agronomic conditions, on the basis of the emerging concepts that plant can enhance vitamin C synthesis as part of defense responses.
维生素 C 参与多种生理过程，包括免疫刺激、胶原蛋白、激素、神经递质和铁吸收的合成。严重缺乏会导致坏血病，而有限的维生素 C 摄入会导致一般症状，如增加感染、疲劳、失眠和体重减轻的易感性。令人惊讶的是，维生素 C 缺乏症在发展中国家和发达国家都很普遍，后者实际上试图通过膳食补充剂和食物强化来克服这种缺乏。因此，旨在提高食物植物中维生素 C 含量的新策略将有助于改善人类健康。有趣的是，植物不仅是在最佳生长条件下生产维生素 C 的活生物反应器，而且它们还可以作为应激条件的结果增加其维生素 C 含量。概述了旨在提高植物性食物中维生素 C 水平的不同方法。它们包括通过“经典”育种、生物工程和农业条件变化进行的基因型选择，这是基于植物可以增强维生素 C 合成作为防御反应一部分的新概念。
