Home › Nutrition › NUTRITION WHY’S #35: WHY ZINC ? Zinc is a very important trace mineral that helps to maintain your immune function. It helps protect against invading bacteria and viruses and some studies show that it can help with recovery from the common cold.

NUTRITION WHY’S #35: WHY ZINC ? Zinc is a very important trace mineral that helps to maintain your immune function. It helps protect against invading bacteria and viruses and some studies show that it can help with recovery from the common cold.

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NUTRITION WHY’S #35: WHY ZINC ? Zinc is a very important trace mineral that helps to maintain your immune function. It helps protect against invading bacteria and viruses and some studies show that it can help with recovery from the common cold. Zinc is also important in taste and smell and in maintaining fertility. Before there was Viagra men took zinc as a male performance enhancer with little evidence that it worked. Many of the enzymes in the male prostate and many others involved in everyday metabolism have zinc as a co-enzyme along with B vitamins. Taking over 50 milligrams of zinc with no copper can cause anemia and in the days when men took a lot of zinc, copper deficiency and anemia could occur. In developing countries with high intakes of cereals and grains, deficiency can occur because cereals bind zinc and take it out of the body. Many genes are turned on an off by special proteins (transcription factors) that act by binding weakly to DNA. The DNA containing your genes unwind in loops so to get near the DNA, the proteins that turn them on and off form fingers. These are called zinc fingers because zinc interacts at a distance with four amino acids in the protein to form each of the zinc fingers (see the slide). The Recommended intakes for zinc: 11 milligrams for men and 8 milligrams for women. Most multivitamins have 20 milligrams of zinc and 3 milligrams of copper. Food sources include red meat, seafood, wheat germ, grains, oysters, and some vegetables including spinach. It is easiest to get your zinc from Balanced Nutrition including a Multivitamin/multi-mineral to be sure you get your trace minerals every day! To learn more go to www.drdavidheber.com and www.herbalifenutritioninstitute.com

A post shared by Dr. David Heber (@drdavidheber) on

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Categories: Nutrition

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