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Some Interrelationships of Dietary Iron, Copper and Cobalt in Metabolism¹

Department of Chemistry, Columbia University, New York

Five diets of varying ratios of iron, copper and cobalt were fed to young healthy albino rats and the effect of the three metals on food intake, growth, hemoglobin level and metal storage and retention determined. The results were as follows:

1. Low levels of iron or copper decreased food intake, growth and hemoglobin level, but 0.003 p.p.m. to 0.08 p.p.m. of cobalt in the diet showed no difference in these responses.

2. Tentatively, cobalt retention, at levels characteristic of the food supply, was calculated. Cobalt retention on low cobalt diets (0.003 p.p.m. cobalt) was 30 to 42%, while retention on high cobalt diets (0.08 p.p.m. cobalt) was 3.3 to 4.9%.

3. The cobalt content per gm of fresh rat carcass varied with the diet, age and sex of the animals.

4. Iron and copper did not affect cobalt retention nor cobalt markedly iron and copper retention.

5. The iron and copper in the basal milk diet were relatively poorly utilized by the rat. Added copper doubled this iron retention, while added iron had only a small or insignificant effect on this copper retention, within the range of iron used in these experiments.

6. The body conserved its iron with relatively greater efficiency than its copper.

7. While anemic animals retain more metal than normal animals on the same diet, a normal animal becoming anemic on a copper-low diet retains less copper than a litter mate in better condition on a good copper diet.

Manuscript received 7 November 1945.