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Vitamin C Nutriture Has Little Short-Term Effect on Vitamin E Concentrations in Healthy Women^1,2,3,

Robert A. Jacob⁴, Mark A. Kutnink, A. Saari Csallany^*, Malgosia Daroszewska and Graham W. Burton

Western Human Nutrition Research Center, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Presidio of San Francisco, CA 94129 ^* University of Minnesota, Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition, St. Paul, MN 55108 Steacie Institute for Molecular Sciences, National Research Council of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K1A OR6

To determine whether the postulated sparing effect of vitamin E by ascorbic acid (AA) is important for human nutrition, we studied vitamin E status in 20 healthy pre-menopausal women (age 20–43 y) with high or low vitamin C intakes for 6 wk in a live-in metabolic unit. The experimental diet contained no fruits and vegetables and provided 5 mg/d of AA (Recommended Dietary Allowance = 60 mg/d), 3 mg/d of -tocopherol (RDA = 10 mg/d) and 42 g/d of tocopherol-stripped safflower oil to increase the vitamin E requirement. Half of the subjects received a daily AA supplement of 495 mg (high AA group). A biochemical ascorbate deficiency was attained in the low AA group as indicated by plasma AA concentrations that reached the lower limit of normal by study d 15. Oral doses (20 mg) of hexadeuterated RRR--tocopherol acetate (d6-T) were given daily to all subjects on d 15–21. Measures of vitamin E status included d6-T and unlabeled -tocopherol concentrations in plasma, platelets, buccal cells and adipose. The levels of unlabeled -tocopherol decreased over time in plasma and platelets and were unchanged for buccal cells and adipose, but were not significantly affected by AA intake. Likewise, the rise and fall of plasma and platelet d6-T, and measures of lipid peroxidation, were not affected by AA intake. Although vitamin C nutriture did not significantly affect vitamin E status within the 6-wk time period of this experiment, further study of this question is warranted, because some of the present results indicate a trend toward sparing of tissue tocopherol by high AA intake.

KEY WORDS: • vitamin C • vitamin E • vitamin interaction • antioxidant • humans

¹ Presented in poster form at Experimental Biology 96, Atlanta, GA [Jacob, R., Kutnink, M., Gretz, D., Daroszewska, M. & Burton, G. (1995) Effects of vitamin C nutriture on vitamin E status of healthy women. FASEB J. 9: A764 (abs.)].

² Reference to a company or product name does not imply approval or recommendation of the product by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to the exclusion of others that may be suitable.

³ The costs of publication of this article were defrayed in part by the payment of page charges. This article must therefore be hereby marked "advertisement" in accordance with 18 USC section 1734 solely to indicate this fact.

⁴ To whom correspondence should be addressed.

Manuscript received 31 December 1995. Revision accepted 4 June 1996.