Want Iron For lunch?

Iron is an essential element to all living organisms. In general, iron is stored in the centre of the cells of metalloproteins and this helps in forming numerous cellular components for the production of toxic free radicals. Iron is found in the heme complex of the animals, plants and fungus. Heme is an essential composite constituted of cyctochrome proteins and helps in redox reactions of oxygen transformation proteins like hemoglobin, leghemoglobin and myoglobin.

The presence of inorganic iron also provides redox reactions in the iron sulfur clusters of various elements like hydrogenase and nitrogenase. Non-heme iron proteins include the existence of elements like monooxygenase, ribonucleotide, hemerythrins, reductase and purple acid phosphatase.

The distribution of iron is highly regulated in mammals and has a high potential for biological toxicity. The regulation of iron is essential for bacteria and hence restricting the existence of iron in bacterial helps in preventing from infections. The fact is due to the existence of low quantity of iron in the milk of the mammalian. The major constituent for the regulation of the iron is due to the transformation of protein and this helps in the binding of the iron from the duodenum from carrying it from the blood to the cells.

Dietary products like poultry, red meat, fish, leaf, beans, vegetable, black-eyed peas, tofu, chickpeas, potatoes with skin, molasses, teff, whole grain bread and farina are the best supplement for iron. The prevalence of iron in the meat is readily absorbed in the human body rather than the iron in the vegetables. Red meat produces the occurrence of the disease colorectal cancer due to the presence of hemoglobin in it.

Dietary supplements complimented with the element iron are called as iron (II) fumarate and iron sulfate, which is easily absorbed, is cheaper than iron fumarate. The elemental iron absorbs to a lesser extent and this is added to the foods containing wheat flour. Iron is important for the body and it converts the chelated in the body to amino acids. Iron in the form of amino acids is ten to fifteen times more bio available and it is used as a common iron supplement. The amino acid selected for this purpose is considered as the cheapest and the most available amino acids like glycine and it leads to the “iron glycinate” supplements.

The component RDA in the iron differs to various extents based on the age, gender and supplement of dietary iron of higher bioavailability. Infants require the presence of iron when they are not breastfeed. People providing blood donations are prone to the risk of lower iron levels and they are recommended to undertake iron supplements.

Excessive intake of iron is deadly and this is because of the ferrous iron reacting with the peroxides for producing free radical highly reactive and this damages DNA, lipids, proteins and other cellular composites. Human beings are prone to the toxicity of iron to the extent of 20 milligrams of iron for every kilogram of mass and lethal dose of 60 milligrams per kilogram.

Excessive intake of iron in children leads to the sumptuous eating habits of ferrous sulfate pills prescribed for the consumption of adult and this leads to the frequent death of children under the age group of six years. The DRI has prescribed upper intake level of 45mg per day for an adult and 40mg per day for children under the age group of fourteen years.