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Nutritional Methodology

Carbon and Nitrogen Stable Isotopic Composition of Hair Protein and Amino Acids Can Be Used as Biomarkers for Animal-Derived Dietary Protein Intake in Humans^1,2

German Institute of Human Nutrition Potsdam-Rehbruecke (DIfE), D-14558 Nuthetal, Germany and ^* Research Unit Nutritional Physiology "Oskar Kellner," Research Institute for the Biology of Farm Animals (FBN), 18196 Dummerstorf, Germany

³To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: petzke{at}mail.dife.de.

The stable nitrogen (¹⁵N) and carbon (¹³C) isotopic composition of tissues reflects the isotopic pattern of food sources. We investigated whether the isotopic composition of human hair can be used as a biomarker to predict the dietary intake of animal-derived food. Hair samples were collected from subjects during a 1987–1988 German nutrition survey (VERA) in which dietary information was collected using a 7-d dietary record. Samples of 50 men and 50 women were randomly selected, in addition to 27 samples of subjects with a reported low meat intake. Isotope ratio MS was used to analyze hair bulk and amino acid–specific isotopic composition. Its relation with and feasibility for predicting animal protein intake were tested using regression analysis and cross-tabulation of observed and predicted dietary data and comparison of the individual values for the binary categories of high and low intake. ¹⁵N and ¹³C abundances strongly predicted relative animal protein and meat intake (R² = 0.31, P < 0.01 and R² = 0.20, P < 0.01, respectively). Distinct patterns of individual hair amino acid ¹⁵N and ¹³C abundances were observed. In contrast to bulk values, the isotopic abundances in individual amino acids did not show discriminating ability across sex and isotope-specific categories. We conclude that hair ¹³C values are as predictive for animal protein consumption as hair ¹⁵N values. Bulk isotopic abundance of hair can be used as a biomarker for animal protein intake to validate dietary assessment methods provided that the correlation between isotopic abundances and dietary protein intake is verified in dietary intervention studies.

KEY WORDS: • animal or plant food protein • amino acids • stable isotopes • hair • biomarker

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