Vitamin C Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Vitamin C, including details on benefits, dosage, supplements, information.

Some vertebrates go with the GLO.

Troadec MB, Kaplan J

Department of Pathology, School of Medicine, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT 84132, USA.

Most vertebrates synthesize vitamin C (ascorbate) de novo from glucose, but humans and certain other mammals cannot. In this issue, Montel-Hagen et al. (2008) demonstrate that erythrocytes from these ascorbate auxotrophs switch the preference of their glucose transporter Glut1 from glucose to dehydroascorbate (DHA), the oxidized form of vitamin C. This substrate preference switch is mediated by the membrane protein stomatin and is an evolutionary adaptation to vitamin C deficiency.

Published 24 March 2008 in Cell, 132(6): 921-2.
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