Vitamin D in human body

Vitamin D is a fat soluble steroid hormone precursor that contributes to the maintenance of normal levels of calcium in the blood stream by increasing absorption of calcium from food and reducing urinary calcium loss (reabsorption by the kidneys).

Both effects keep calcium in the body and therefore spare the calcium that is stored in bones. When necessary, vitamin D transfers calcium from the bone into the bloodstream, which does not benefit bones.

The bones grow denser and stronger as they absorb and deposit the calcium.

Vitamin D is well known for its primary physiological role of regulation of calcium homeostasis in maintaining bone health.

Therefore, vitamin D prevents muscle aches, bone pains, chronic fatigue and osteoporosis.

Vitamin D plays a vital role in the normal functioning of the immune system and blood cell formation and also helps cells "differentiate"—a process that may reduce the risk of cancer.

Growing evidence indicates that vitamin D is also involved in modulating body composition, energy homeostasis, and insulin sensitivity.

From animal and human studies, researchers have hypothesized that vitamin D may protect people from tuberculosis, gum inflammation, multiple sclerosis, autoimmune arthritis, and juvenile diabetes.

Vitamin D controls the growth of normal as well as cancerous cells. It is important role in the prevention of various cancer especially cancer of the colon, prostate pancreas and breast.

Vitamin D is also needed for adequate blood levels of insulin. It stimulates the production of insulin form insulin producing cells in the pancreas.

Vitamin D isn’t actually a vitamin D produced by the body. Vitamin D3 is synthesized in human skin from 7-dehydrochoelsterol following exposure to ultraviolet B (UVB) radiation with wavelength 290 to 320 nm.

This fat soluble vitamin is transported to the liver and kidneys and become activated vitamin D.

There are two sources of vitamin D available for the human body; endogenous synthesis in the skin from exposure to sunlight and exogenous consumption in foods and/or pharmaceutical supplements.
Vitamin D in human body 

Introduction to water soluble vitamins

Vitamins are organic compounds with regulatory functions that are required in the diet if the species (humans) is unable to synthesize them.

Traditionally they are classified according to their solubility water and fat solvents and, from a physiological standpoint; this property determines the pattern of transport excretion and storage within the human body. Solubility bestows on vitamins many of their characteristic behaviors such as how they are absorbed, transported, stored and utilized.

The body handles the water-soluble vitamins differently from the way it handles the fat-soluble vitamins.

They are absorbed into portal blood in contrast to fat-soluble vitamins and with exception of cobalamin (vitamin B12), they cannot be retained for long periods by the body.

The body absorbs water-soluble vitamins easily and just as easily excretes them in the urine. A few of the water-soluble vitamins can remain in the lean tissues for a month or more, but these tissues actively exchange materials with body fluids all the times.

At any time, the vitamins may be picked up by the extracellular fluids, washed away by the blood and excreted the urine. Therefore, water-soluble vitamins need to be consumed more frequently that fat-soluble ones.

This means a greater risk of deficiency with the water-soluble vitamins with a low risk of toxicity.
Introduction to water soluble vitamins

Calcium in human health

Calcium is one of 21 elements known to be essential to humans. Calcium is a very potent mineral, fulfilling different tasks in human bodies. The most important of its functions relate to: mineralization of the bone tissue (bones and teeth), maintaining the cardiac rhythm, coagulating the blood, regulating the acid-basic equilibrium.

Calcium as a nutrient is not useful to health in isolation.  For example, utilization of calcium depends on adequate vitamin D status. Dietary sodium greatly influences renal calcium reabsorption.

Calcium intake is very beneficial for patients that suffer from acute or chronic convulsions, osteoporosis, concentration disorders, headaches, allergies etc.

A deficiency of calcium, whether from decreased provision, decreased absorption or increased excretion, can result in numerous disease situations, especially pertaining to bone. Calcium deficiency leads to anemia, osteoporosis, dental cavities, irregular menses, severe headaches, sexual problems (loss of libido and sexual appetite, erectile dysfunctions etc.), emotional disorders (stress, anxiety, chronic depression), sleep disorders (insomnia) and many other dysfunctions.

Dairy products tend to be the greatest contributors of calcium to the human diet. As much as 55% of calcium in the American diet is derived from dairy products. In smaller quantities, it is found in meat, vegetables (parsley, peas, carrots, kohlrabi, celery, lettuce, radish, scallion, but not in spinach), soy beans and all soy products. Calcium is also present in fruits, bread and fish.

Too much calcium in the blood leads to several disorders or, more severely, to lethargy, confusion and even coma. This can happen to patients that take high amounts of calcium supplements and alkaline substances in the same time (antacid tablets – against gastritis and ulcer symptoms).

It is not uncommon today to find people ingesting very large supplemental amounts of calcium, Sometimes, their intake can climb above 10 times their RDA.
Calcium in human health

What are the functions of glycogen?

The excess carbohydrates will be converted to fat and stored in body as fat.  The main stores of glycogen in the body are found in skeletal muscle and liver, although most other cells store small amounts of glycogen for their own use.

Stored glycogen is synthesized during a high carbohydrate meal due to hyperglycemia and an increase in the insulin: glucagon ratio.

Muscle glycogen 
The function of muscle glycogen is to serve as a fuel reserve for the synthesis of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) during muscle contraction.

The production of energy from glucose involves oxidation of sugar with the release of water and carbon dioxide, which are easily removed from the body.

Liver glycogen
Liver glycogen function is to maintain the blood glucose levels, particularly during the early stages of a fast.

The liver releases glucose from the breakdown of glycogen and from gluconeogenesis for utilization by peripheral tissues mainly the brain cells and red blood cells.
What are the functions of glycogen?

Deficiency of vitamins K in human body

Vitamin K is an essential nutrient that is required as a cofactor for the production of a handful of coagulation cascade proteins.

As a rule, vitamin K deficiency is rare – almost everyone gets more than enough from their own bacteria and from their food.

The intestinal tract of a new born infant is sterile. For this reason, the baby is unable to produce vitamin K until the intestine is colonized with bacteria from the infant’s environment, usually within 24 hrs.

To make up for them, most newborns are given an injection of a tiny amount of vitamin K soon after birth. 

Vitamin K deficiency is rarely seen in adults, because most diets contain enough vitamin K for normal physiological functioning. When adults get vitamin K deficiency, it’s generally because they eat very few green vegetables or because they have been taking oral antibiotics for a long time.

The antibiotics kill off the intestine bacteria that make vitamin K. Sometimes vitamin K deficiency is caused by liver disease or a problem digesting fat.

Abnormal blood coagulation is more likely to arise from secondary causes such as malabsorption syndromes or biliary obstruction than from a dietary inadequacy of vitamin K.

Vitamin K deficiency causes bug black and blue marks from very slight bruises or even for no reason, nosebleeds, blood in your urine and intestinal bleeding.
Deficiency of vitamins K in human body

Fat in human body

Fat is an essential nutrient, which contributes approximately 30-45% of food energy in western diets. In technical they are referred to as lipids.

Fats have physical, chemical and physiologic properties that make them important in nutrition. In addition to fats ingested as food, there are specific lipids synthesized by the human body that are essential to life.

Fat along with proteins and carbohydrates, one of the three nutrients are used as energy sources by the body.

Energy is one of the principal nutritional requirements of man and fat is a principal source of the energy. Each grams of fat consumed supplies the body with 9 calories worth of energy. Fat is composed of glycerol and one to three fatty acids and serves as a key energy source from many cells in the body.

In addition, certain fatty acids can play a regulatory role in the body by serving as precursors for eicosanoids.

Meanwhile cholesterol is a lipid substance that plays as structure role in cell membranes and is a precursor for steroid hormones.

The layer of fat is not evenly distributed throughout the body. In men it is generally concentrated in the chest, accentuating the profile of the cleft below the pectoral area; in the chin; in the stomach and in the buttocks.

In the women, fat tends to the shape of the breast, the chin, the stomach, the thighs and especially the area around the pelvis and up to the end of the gluteus muscles.  In males, of the total body mass it constitutes 3%, whereas it amounts to about 20% of the total body fat. In case of females, it is 30% of the body fat and about 9% of the body mass.
Fat in human body