PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Americans' vitamin D levels are highest in August, lowest in February, study shows

Findings by UCI-Mayo Clinic team will help explain nutrient's role in seasonal illnesses

2013-06-22
(Press-News.org) Irvine, Calif. – UC Irvine and Mayo Clinic researchers have found that vitamin D levels in the U.S. population peak in August and bottom out in February. The essential vitamin – necessary for healthy bones – is produced in the skin upon exposure to ultraviolet B rays from the sun.

Vitamin D helps bones absorb calcium and can protect against osteoporosis. It's also thought to play a role in seasonal illnesses, such as the flu. Low levels of vitamin D are believed to impair "innate immunity" i.e., the body's first line of defense against pathogens. To further study this link, good estimates of the cyclicality of the vitamin are necessary. Solar exposure – a timely topic since June 21 marks the first day of summer – is the most important way people acquire vitamin D. But certain foods, including egg yolks and oil-rich fish like mackerel, salmon, sardines and herring contain the nutrient. In addition, milk and cereal are often enriched with vitamin D.

"Even with food fortification, vitamin D levels in the population show a high level of seasonality due to the influence of sunlight," said Amy Kasahara, a UC Irvine graduate student in public health and first author on the paper, which appears in the journal PLOS ONE.

"The exact biochemical pathways from UVB rays to vitamin D were discovered in the 1970s," she said. "In this study, we have shown that vitamin D levels lag the solar cycle, peaking in August and troughing in February."

The correlation between the seasons and vitamin D has been known for some time. "What we have been able to do is put a lot more precision on the estimates of vitamin D seasonality," said Andrew Noymer, associate professor of public health and senior author of the article.

"Our analysis, combined with other data, will help contribute to understanding the role of vitamin D in all seasonal diseases, where the simple winter/spring/summer/fall categories are not sufficient."

Researchers measured the level of 25-hydroxyvitamin D in 3.4 million blood samples collected weekly in the U.S. between July 2006 and December 2011.

The study looked at population averages, so people shouldn't make assumptions about their own levels of vitamin D based on the calendar. Healthcare providers can perform individual blood tests to measure vitamin D directly, and supplements are available for those who cannot or do not receive enough exposure to sunlight.

Ravinder J. Singh of the Mayo Clinic co-authored the work.

### About the University of California, Irvine: Founded in 1965, UCI is a top-ranked university dedicated to research, scholarship and community service. Led by Chancellor Michael Drake since 2005, UCI is among the most dynamic campuses in the University of California system, with more than 28,000 undergraduate and graduate students, 1,100 faculty and 9,400 staff. Orange County's second-largest employer, UCI contributes an annual economic impact of $4.3 billion. For more UCI news, visit news.uci.edu.

News Radio: UCI maintains on campus an ISDN line for conducting interviews with its faculty and experts. Use of this line is available for a fee to radio news programs/stations that wish to interview UCI faculty and experts. Use of the ISDN line is subject to availability and approval by the university.

Contact: Laura Rico
949-824-9055
lrico@uci.edu

UCI maintains an online directory of faculty available as experts to the media. To access, visit http://www.today.uci.edu/experts.


ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Oddest couple ever found

2013-06-22
Synchrotron imaging reveals odd couple - 250 million years ago, a mammal forerunner and an amphibian shared a burrow. Scientists from South Africa, Australia and France have discovered a world first association while scanning a 250 million year old fossilized burrow from the Karoo Basin of South Africa. The burrow revealed two unrelated vertebrate animals nestled together and fossilized after being trapped by a flash flood event. Facing harsh climatic conditions subsequent to the Permo-Triassic (P-T) mass extinction, the amphibian Broomistega and the mammal forerunner ...

Assessing performance of colonoscopy procedures improves quality

2013-06-22
DOWNERS GROVE, Ill. – June 21, 2013 – A new study reports that the use of a quarterly report card is associated with improved colonoscopy quality indicators. Endoscopists at the Roudebush Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Indianapolis, Ind., who participated in the study showed an overall adjusted adenoma (precancerous polyp) detection rate increase from 44.7 percent to 53.9 percent, and a cecal intubation rate increase from 95.6 percent to 98.1 percent. These two metrics are validated measures of colonoscopy performance quality. The study appears in the June issue of ...

New Notre Dame paper offers insights into how cancer cells avoid cell death

2013-06-22
A new study by a team of researchers from the University of Notre Dame provides an important new insight into how cancer cells are able to avoid the cell death process. The findings may suggest a chemotherapeutic approach to prevent the spread of cancers. Metastasis, the spread of cancer from one organ to other parts of the body, relies on cancer cells ability to evade a cell death process called anoikis, according to Zachary T. Schafer, Coleman Assistant Professor of Cancer Biology at Notre Dame. Metalizing cancer cells are able to survive anoikis, which normally results ...

Innovative intervention program improves life for rural women in India living with HIV/AIDS

2013-06-22
A multidisciplinary team of researchers from UCLA and India has found that a new type of intervention program, in which lay women in the rural Indian province of Andra Pradesh were trained as social health activists to assist women who have HIV/AIDS, significantly improved patients' adherence to antiretroviral therapy and boosted their immune-cell counts and nutrition levels. The lay women were trained by the research team to serve as accredited social health activists, or ASHA, and their work was overseen by rural nurses and physicians. These ASHA then provided counseling ...

5 years of stereo imaging for NASA's TWINS

2013-06-22
Surrounding Earth is a dynamic region called the magnetosphere. The region is governed by magnetic and electric forces, incoming energy and material from the sun, and a vast zoo of waves and processes unlike what is normally experienced in Earth-bound physics. Nestled inside this constantly changing magnetic bubble lies a donut of charged particles generally aligned with Earth's equator. Known as the ring current, its waxing and waning is a crucial part of the space weather surrounding our planet, able to induce magnetic fluctuations on the ground as well as to transmit ...

Messier 61 looks straight into Hubble's camera

2013-06-22
The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured this image of nearby spiral galaxy Messier 61, also known as NGC 4303. The galaxy, located only 55 million light-years away from Earth, is roughly the size of the Milky Way, with a diameter of around 100 000 light-years. The galaxy is notable for one particular reason — six supernovae have been observed within Messier 61, a total that places it in the top handful of galaxies alongside Messier 83, also with six, and NGC 6946, with a grand total of nine observed supernovae. In this Hubble image the galaxy is seen face-on ...

Wilfire smoke over Alaska

2013-06-22
On June 19, 2013, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Aqua satellite captured this image of smoke from wildfires burning in western Alaska. The smoke was moving west over Norton Sound. (The center of the image is roughly 163° West and 62° North.) Red outlines indicate hot spots where MODIS detected unusually warm surface temperatures associated with fire. According to an advisory released by the Alaska Interagency Coordination Center, record heat and dry fuels have produced record-setting fire potential across boreal spruce forests and tundra ...

Sun emits a solstice CME

2013-06-22
On June 20, 2013, at 11:24 p.m., the sun erupted with an Earth-directed coronal mass ejection or CME, a solar phenomenon that can send billions of tons of particles into space that can reach Earth one to three days later. These particles cannot travel through the atmosphere to harm humans on Earth, but they can affect electronic systems in satellites and on the ground. Experimental NASA research models, based on observations from NASA's Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory and ESA/NASA's Solar and Heliospheric Observatory show that the CME left the sun at speeds of ...

Risk factors affect the incidence of childhood pneumonia in modern urban apartment?

2013-06-22
Childhood pneumonia is the leading causes of death among children in China and worldwide. Using coal or wood as cooking fuel in rural area was considered as major cause of Pneumonia. However, the incidence of childhood pneumonia is still high in urban modern cities. Which home risk factors affect the incidence of childhood pneumonia in modern urban apartment? Professor Hua QIAN and his group from School of Energy and Environment, Southeast University set out to research this problem. A recent study found that the risk factors in indoor environment typical of modern apartments ...

Some bankrupt Applebee's restaurants in Chicago might close

2013-06-22
Some bankrupt Applebee's restaurants in Chicago might close Article provided by Michael J. Logan, Ltd. Visit us at http://www.mikeloganlaw.com The economy has taken a toll on many large and small businesses throughout the U.S. Some business owners have decided to call it quits, but other business owners have considered the option of bankruptcy. That is the case for one Applebee's franchisee. According to the Herald-News, a recent bankruptcy filing by an Applebee's franchisee might lead to more than half of the Chicago-area restaurants closing. Bankruptcy court ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

MSU team develops scalable climate solutions for agricultural carbon markets

Playing an instrument may protect against cognitive aging

UNM study finds link between Grand Canyon landslide and Meteor Crater impact

Ultra-hot Jupiter’s death spiral could reveal stellar secrets

You only get one brain! The best helmet material for protecting your noggin

Neurodegeneration and stroke after GLP-1RAs in diabetes and obesity

Pediatric COVID-19 hospitalization trends by race and ethnicity, 2020-2023

Research spotlight: New genetic roadmap offers insights into obesity and diabetes

Fred Hutch leads new Vanguard Study for Cancer Screening Research Network

‘Mismatched’ transplants now safe, effective for blood cancer patients, study finds

New research helps narrow down uncertainties in near-term precipitation projections for the Asian Water Tower

AI tool accurately detects tumor location on breast MRI

Researchers use OCT imaging to uncover how the fallopian tube transports embryos

PolyU secures RGC theme-based research scheme funding to develop cost-effective and sustainable Co-GenAI model

Van Andel Institute scientists develop technique for high-resolution single cell epigenetic analysis

The Lundquist Institute wins multi-year NIH grant exceeding $11 million to transform diagnosis and treatment of deadly mucormycosis

Review suggests ending adult boosters for tetanus, diphtheria

ESMT Berlin welcomes Rebecca Schaumberg to faculty

Blocking a little-known protein may offer new hope for devastating lung disease

Medieval medicine was smarter than you think – and weirdly similar to TikTok trends

FAU receives NIH grant to investigate amphetamine addiction

Realizing on-site carbon nanotube photo-thermoelectric imaging

Most of us love memes. But are they a form of comics?

Novel biosensor allows real-time monitoring of sucrose uptake in plants

Korea University researchers reveal revealing how WEE1 drives cancer resistance to immunotherapy

Pusan National University researchers develop breakthrough deep learning model that enhances handheld 3D medical imaging

SLAS Discovery and SLAS Technology demonstrate research impact with 2024 impact factors

Disease-causing bacteria can deal with stink as long as they get a meal

Mapping the metabolism of blood stem cells

UK air quality improved since 2015 but targets still missed

[Press-News.org] Americans' vitamin D levels are highest in August, lowest in February, study shows
Findings by UCI-Mayo Clinic team will help explain nutrient's role in seasonal illnesses