ABSTRACT
Intestinal absorption rates in animals generally have been related either to mucosal or intestinal wet weight or protein content or to total body weight or surface area. Approximately 65% of dietary carbohydrate consists of polysaccharides that require digestion to monosaccharides prior to intestinal absorption. An alternative mechanism for altering normal intestinal absorption of monosaccharides might involve a change in enzymes concerned with intestinal mucosal sugar metabolism. In general, if the intestinal absorption of passively or actively transported substances is found to be depressed with advancing age, one expects that this holds also for the water-soluble vitamins. Although pharmacological vitamin and mineral supplementation has been employed for many years in order to evaluate body vitamin needs with aging, most studies have not been double-blind and have used subjective and not objective criteria. Human micronutrient status can be determined also by measuring the consequences of physiologic depletion or the effects of dietary supplementation upon function.
