IMPROVING THE NUTRIENT COMPOSITION OF PLANTS TO ENHANCE HUMAN NUTRITION AND HEALTH

TLDR

Plant foods supply essential minerals, organic nutrients, and phytochemicals, but many of these components are present at low levels, driving research into the physiological, biochemical, and molecular mechanisms that govern their transport, synthesis, and accumulation, with general strategies applicable across nutrients. The review seeks to develop crop‑manipulation strategies that improve nutritional quality by elucidating the physiology and biochemistry of iron and vitamin E and outlining the information and approaches required to enhance their plant composition. The authors examine the plant nutritional physiology and biochemistry of iron and vitamin E, describing the data and strategies needed to boost their mineral or organic nutrient content.

Abstract

Plant foods contain almost all of the mineral and organic nutrients established as essential for human nutrition, as well as a number of unique organic phytochemicals that have been linked to the promotion of good health. Because the concentrations of many of these dietary constituents are often low in edible plant sources, research is under way to understand the physiological, biochemical, and molecular mechanisms that contribute to their transport, synthesis and accumulation in plants. This knowledge can be used to develop strategies with which to manipulate crop plants, and thereby improve their nutritional quality. Improvement strategies will differ between various nutrients, but generalizations can be made for mineral or organic nutrients. This review focuses on the plant nutritional physiology and biochemistry of two essential human nutrients, iron and vitamin E, to provide examples of the type of information that is needed, and the strategies that can be used, to improve the mineral or organic nutrient composition of plants.