[Effect of DNA and RNA in foods on serum uric acid concentration in the human].

Nutritional experiments with formula diets show, that DNA taken orally raises the serum uric acid concentration only half as much as does the same quantity of RNA. In evaluating the suitability of foods used in the diet of patients with gout, however, food is only judged by its total purine-N content. In commercially available raw food the total purine content was determined enzymatically as uric acid. In the same samples the content of RNA, DNA, nucleotides, nucleosides and bases was determined. Eight healthy persons took part in a nutritional experiment, which began with a diet low in purines. During the first phase of the experiment, the participants ate 150 g veal-liver in addition to the low purine diet; in the second phase, they ate 80 g pork-spleen. In both additional foods, subjects took in an equal amount of total purines, determined as uric acid, but RNA dominated in veal-liver, DNA in pork-spleen. There was no statistically significant difference in the effect on serum uric acid concentration and urinary uric acid excretion between eating liver and spleen, however.