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Updated: Sep 10, 2025

Measurement of Heme Synthesis Levels in Mammalian Cells
Published on: July 9, 2015
Molecular Insight into the Binding of Heme to β-Lactoglobulin: Effect on the Intestinal Iron Absorption and
Jianglan Yuan1, Congxin Lei1, Yuchen Duan1
1Cooperative Innovation Center of Industrial Fermentation (Ministry of Education & Hubei Province), School of Life and Health Sciences, Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan 430068, China.
Abstract:
Heme is widely recognized as an effective iron supplement. In vitro experiments suggested a relatively low bioaccessibility of free heme due to its strong hydrophobicity. The study prepared a β-lactoglobulin-heme nanocomplex (β-Lg-He) to improve the bioaccessibility of heme. The results indicated that heme could spontaneously bind to β-Lg mainly through hydrogen bonds and van der Waals forces to form water-soluble and uniform nanocomplexes. Simulated gastrointestinal digestion experiments showed that bioaccessibility of heme in β-Lg-He was more than 80%, while that of free heme was only about 8.0%, and the serum iron levels of mice in β-Lg-He groups were higher than those in heme groups and control groups. The results of in vivo experiments revealed that β-Lg-He could have a more beneficial effect on the intestinal microbiota of mice than free heme, which was an additional function for the high-efficiency iron supplement.
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