Some science behind the scenes
Minerals
Chemical elements in order of abundance in the human body include the seven major dietary elements calcium, phosphorus, potassium, sulphur, sodium, chloride, and magnesium. All these are essential to human life and help in the building of cells and in the functioning of the nervous system.
Important "trace" or minor dietary elements, necessary for mammalian life, include iron, cobalt, copper, zinc, molybdenum, iodide, manganese, chromium, and selenium.
Trace amounts of some elements e.g., boron, are known to have a role but the exact biochemical nature is not yet known. Arsenic, silicon, and vanadium have established, albeit specialised, biochemical roles as structural or functional cofactors in other organisms, and are thus possibly used by humans. Strontium is believed to be involved in the utilization of calcium in the body. In contrast, tungsten, bromine, and cadmium, for example, have specialized biochemical uses in certain lower organisms, but these elements appear not to be used by humans.
Minerals in mammals are normally obtained via the food chain. Plants absorb dissolved elements in soils, which are subsequently ingested by either humans directly or by herbivores. If we then eat the herbivores, we get minerals that way. The liver of many animals, for example, is rich in iron.
Bacteria play an essential role in the process that results in the release of nutrients both for their own nutrition and for the nutrition of others in the ecological food chain. One element, cobalt, is available for use by animals only after having been processed into usable molecules (e.g., vitamin B12), by bacteria. “Scientists are only recently starting to appreciate the magnitude and role that microorganisms have in the global cycling and formation of biominerals”.
The following summary table derived from Wikipedia shows an overview of the minerals, the main dietary sources and their uses. Each mineral has its own entry in the suppression section with a far more detailed table of the sources, there is an entry in the overload section for corresponding imbalances.
Dietary element |
Category |
Dietary sources |
Imbalance |
is a systemic electrolyte and is essential in coregulating ATP with sodium. |
Radishes Red peppers Soy sauce, Chocolate Seaweed Alliums |
Hypokalemia hyperkalemia |
|
is needed for production of hydrochloric acid in the stomach and in cellular pump functions. |
Table salt (sodium chloride) is the main dietary source. |
||
is a systemic electrolyte and is essential in coregulating ATP with potassium. |
Table salt (sodium chloride, the main source). |
-Hyponatremia -Hypernatremia |
|
is needed for muscle, heart and digestive system health, builds bone, supports synthesis and function of blood cells. |
Dairy products |
-Hypocalcaemia -Hypercalcaemia |
|
is a component of bones (see apatite), cells, in energy processing and many other functions. |
Hypophosphatemia hyperphosphatemia |
||
is required for processing ATP and for bones. |
hypomagnesemia, |
||
is pervasive and required for several enzymes also key to the immune system. |
Oysters Seeds Fish and shellfish Mushrooms Spices Chocolate Maple syrup |
||
is required for many proteins and enzymes, notably hemoglobin. |
Tofu |
Iron imbalance |
|
is a cofactor in enzyme functions. |
Spices Wholegrains Nuts Maple syrup |
manganism |
|
|
is required component of many redox enzymes, including cytochrome c oxidase. |
Mushrooms, spinach, greens, seeds, raw cashews, raw walnuts, tempeh, barley. |
copper toxicity |
Iodine |
is required not only for the synthesis of thyroid hormones, thyroxine and triiodothyronine and to prevent goiter, but also, probably as an antioxidant, for extrathyroidal organs as mammary and salivary glands and for gastric mucosa and immune system (thymus): |
Sea vegetables, iodized salt, eggs. Alternate but inconsistent sources of iodine: strawberries, mozzarella cheese, yogurt, milk, fish, shellfish. |
iodism |
a cofactor essential to activity of antioxidant enzymes like glutathione peroxidase. |
Brazil nuts, cold water wild fish (cod, halibut, salmon), tuna, lamb, turkey, calf liver, mustard, mushrooms, barley, cheese, garlic, tofu, seeds. |
selenosis |
|
the oxidases xanthine oxidase, aldehyde oxidase, and sulfite oxidase. |
Tomatoes, onions, carrots. |
||
Relatively large quantities of sulfur are required, it is used for amino acids |
Protein, alliums - see sulphur entry |
No name |
|
Cobalt is required in the synthesis of vitamin B12 |
See foods containing vitamin B12 |
Because bacteria are required to synthesize the vitamin, it is usually considered part of vitamin B12 deficiency rather than its own dietary element deficiency. Cobalt poisoning is a problem. |