Water-soluble vitamins: research update

For more than 50 years, the Food and Nutrition Board of the National Academy of Sciences has been reviewing nutrition research and defining nutrient requirements for healthy people, referred to as the recommended dietary allowances (RDA). As new nutrition research is published, the importance of vitamins as vital nutrients is underscored, and new physiologic roles and applications to human health are examined and considered with regard to updating the RDA. Each year a substantial amount of research is published on vitamins. This article examines and summarizes noteworthy research published on individual water-soluble vitamins (excluding vitamin C) in the past 12 months, provides relevant background information on these vitamins, and offers critical reviews as appropriate.