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minerals (nutrition)
cobalt (Co)
Nutrition

definition

Cobalt:
» overview:
• Considered an essential mineral and is an integral part of vitamin B12, or cobalamin

» metabolism:
• Cobalt in an intrinsic part of vitamin B12. However most cobalt is absorbed through sources other than vitamin B12. In the body only 10% of cobalt is found as vitamin B12.
• Iron deficiency increases absorption of cobalamin.
• Where cyanocobalamin is mainly stored in the liver, cobalt is initially deposited in the liver and kidneys and later in the bone, spleen, pancreas, intestine, and other tissues.

» Chinese:
• Tonifies the Qi; tonifies the Qi to transform Xue (Blood).

» function:
• Involved as a constituent of cyanocobalamin, cobalt is essential to the normal function of cells: particularly the bone marrow, the nervous system, and the gastrointestinal tract.
• Necessary for maintenance of red blood cells
• In addition, cobalt has been found to function independently from B12 in the form of glycylglycine dipeptidase.
• Activates a number of enzymes in the body

» requirements:
• RDA: none established at this time
• Estimated safe and adequate daily dietary intake (ESADDI): 2µg per day
• Average intake in the U.S.: 5-20 µg per day
• Dietary cobalt comes primarily from vegetables and whole grains which contain no vitamin B12.

» food sources:
• See Vitamin B12. Vitamin B12 usually comes from animal products, although it may also be found in some bacterially contaminated foods.
• Meats, especially liver and kidney, oysters, clams, milk, green leafy vegetables

» deficiency:
• Cobalt deficiency is rare but cyanocobalamin is not uncommon in vegans or in people with malabsorption syndromes, pernicious anemia, or in surgically treated persons who have had their distal ileum or stomach removed.
• In certain areas of the Soviet Union, the incidence of goiter is related to deficient levels of cobalt in food and drink. In rats cobalt may be necessary for the formation of thyroxine.
• Excess levels of inorganic cobalt have been found to cause goiters.
• Wild animals have 2-6 times more cobalt in their tissues than Westerners.

» therapeutics:
Hypertension: 50 mg per day for 10-65 days caused vasodilation, release of bradykinin and lowered Blood pressure in 8 of 9 subjects. No side effects were noted. (Perry and Schroeder 1954; LaGoff, J.M. J Qual. 38:, 1940)
Pernicious anemia

» toxicity:
• At high oral doses cobalt can cause goiter, and proliferation of bone marrow erythropoietic cells. This response may occur in people who are given frequent IM cobalt and/or who have excessive exposure other than through the diet. Injections of cobalt oxides or sulfides has been shown to produce proliferation of otherwise normal cells and to form cancer in both animals and humans at the injection site in muscle or thyroid tissue. This only occurs if the cobalt is injected. Children tend to be much more sensitive to oral cobalt. Doses of greater than 1mg/kg body weight will cause cardiotoxic reactions.
In years past beer was treated with cobalt salts to enhance the foaming. Heavy beer drinkers would sometimes die of cardiac damage. Administration of methionine and cysteine protect against this effect.

» interactions:
• Iron deficiency increases absorption of cobalamin.


footnotes

Kirschmann and Dunne, p. 71

LaGoff, J.M. J Qual. 38:, 1940.

Marz, Russell. Medical Nutrition From Marz. Second Edition. Portland, OR. 1997.

Perry and Schroeder 1954.