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Some Factors in the Chinese Diet Affecting Carotene Utilization¹

Department of Foods and Nutrition, School of Home Economics, Kansas State College, Manhattan

Liver storage of vitamin A after 4 weeks' supplementation to previously depleted rats was used to judge the effects on the biological value of carotene produced by varying the type of oil in a purified diet, by supplementing soybean oil with lecithin or ascorbic acid and by using different vegetables as the source of carotene in a Chinese diet.

Among the three oils commonly used in China, sesame oil in the diet produced significantly higher carotene utilization than did soybean or peanut oil. This superiority of sesame oil was at variance with its relative tocopherol content; possibly levels of tocopherol intake (0.08 to 0.27 mg daily) were too low for anti-oxigenic effects to be apparent. The addition of 1% lecithin or 0.1% ascorbic acid to the diet containing 5% soybean oil produced no significant synergistic effects when the average daily carotene intake was 91 µg.

With respect to the utilization values of carotene in vegetables readily available in China: carrots, sweet potato, and a green leafy vegetable (woo-chei-pei) did not differ significantly, and were 35 to 67% of the utilization value for crystalline carotene in the Chinese-soybean oil diet.

We wish to acknowledge the assistance of Dr. Helen Clark of the Department of Foods and Nutrition for her valuable suggestions and help in animal laboratory work.

We are indebted to Dr. O. H. Elmer, Department of Botany, for his donation of a high carotene-content variety of sweet potato, Red Nancy, and to Dr. C. D. Evans, in charge of the Edible Oil Section, Oil and Protein Division, Northern Regional Research Laboratory, U. S. Department of Agriculture, for the cold pressed soybean oil.

² Research fellow, supported by a grant from the China International Foundation. Present address: Shanghai, China.

Manuscript received 26 June 1953.