植物维生素E生物强化研究进展

维生素E是一种只能在光合组织中合成的脂溶性小分子有机化合物，是人体和动物营养不可缺少的重要维生素。由于植物中维生素E含量较低，人类大多处于慢性缺乏维生素E--“隐性饥饿”的状态，而动物饲料中则需要添加外源合成的维生素E以满足其营养需求。因此，提高植物中维生素E的含量是改善维生素E缺乏的重要途径之一。从维生素E的合成途径入手，详细地综述了维生素E合成关键酶基因的表达变化以及前体物质的含量变化对维生素E合成的影响，发现三烯生育酚和α-生育酚的生物强化效果较好，而生育酚总量提高受限；进而从遗传的角度探讨了维生素E合成受限的原因以及遗传上可能影响维生素E合成的其他代谢途径；最后结合可能影响维生素E合成的调控因子以及其前体物质的转运等方面为今后维生素E的生物强化提出了新的思路。

Progress of Vitamin E Biofortification in Plants

Vitamin E is a kind of fat-soluble antioxidant and it is synthesized only by photosynthetic organisms. Vitamin E is an important and indispensable vitamin for human and livestock. Due to the low content of vitamin E in plants, most of people are in a state of chronic deficiency of vitamin E--“hidden hunger”. Synthetic vitamin E is supplemented in the feed for optimal animal growth. Therefore, increasing the content of vitamin E in plants is one of the important ways to improve vitamin E deficiency. Starting from the biosynthetic pathway of vitamin E, this paper summarized the influence of key enzymes expression and precursors content on vitamin E in detail, pointed out that the biofortification effect of tocotrienol and α-tocopherol was efficient, while the increase of tocopherol content was limited. Furthermore, the reasons for the limitation of vitamin E biosynthesis and other metabolic pathways that may affect vitamin E synthesis were discussed from the genetic point of view. Finally, a new idea was proposed for vitamin E biofortification in the future by combining with the regulatory factors that may affect the biosynthesis of vitamin E and the transport of its precursors.