colorful vitamin a foods

vitamin a foods ... facts ... and benefits ...

Why was vitamin a so called? ...

The answer's fairly simple - it was the very first vitamin to be discovered.

This essential human nutrient is fat-soluble, which means that any excess can be stored in your body for future use.

However, you'll also need to include zinc in your diet, as this will help transport it from your liver so that it can be used in your body tissues.

Vitamin a has a tremendously wide variety of uses.

Let's take a look at some of them ...

benefits of vitamin a

How does vitamin a benefit your health?

Well, it's necessary for such things as:

eye-sight
bone growth
reproduction
cell growth
boosting your immune system
promoting healthy surface linings in general

vitamin a foods

It's obviously an extremely important vitamin, so ... what are vitamin a food sources?

There are two types of foods rich in vitamin a:

animal sources
plant sources

And they each contain a different form of the vitamin.

1. Animal Sources

The vitamin form you'll discover in animal foods is known as preformed vitamin a, and your body absorbs it in the form of retinol, which is a tremendously active form of the vitamin.

You'll find it in such foods as:

liver
eggs
whole milk
various fortified foods

2. Plant Sources

The other form of vitamin a is the one you'll come across in colorful fruit and vegetables - in particular green leafy vegetables, and yellow and orange ones. For example:

carrots
spinach
kale
cantaloupes
apricots

This form of the vitamin is known as provitamin a carotenoid, of which beta-carotene is the most efficient - and best-known.

vitamin a toxicity

Can you take too much vitamin a in your diet?

The rather complicated answer to this is that, yes, you can have too much of the preformed vitamin a (in other words, the type found in animal foods), but it's extremely unlikely that you'll have too much provitamin a carotenoid (found in fruit and veg).

In developed countries, people tend to slightly overdo preformed vitamin a, the recommended vitamin a dosage for adults being:

males - 900 micrograms of retinol activity equivalents
females - 700 microgram of retinol activity equivalents

It's thought that an excess of vitamin a from animal foods could increase your risk of osteoporosis.

vitamin a deficiency

What about too little vitamin a?

Normally, this is unlikely to occur in developed countries unless, for example, you regularly drink too much alcohol - which will eventually deplete your stores of vitamin a.

Or, you suffer from long-term problems absorbing fat.

However, vitamin a deficiency is extremely common in underdeveloped countries, resulting in night blindness, a general inability to fight infections, and poor bones and teeth.

So brighten up your life with colorful fruit and veg ... and get plenty of vitamin a while your at it!