Two Sources of Vitamin A

Apr 6
13:21

2011

Judy He

Judy He

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Vitamin A is familiar to everyone. And it is a common type of vitamin that exists in many kinds of plants. It can be easily found in animal organs as well. Generally it is suggested for everyone to ingest adequately because it does goods to our health.

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Vitamin A is familiar to everyone. And it is a common type of vitamin that exists in many kinds of plants. It can be easily found in animal organs as well. Generally it is suggested for everyone to ingest adequately because it does goods to our health. 

There are generally two kinds of food containing a large amount of vitamin A. The first type is provitamin A or all kinds of carotenes. In other words,Two Sources of Vitamin A Articles vitamin A exists in many plants, such as green vegetables, yellow vegetables and fruit. Spinach, clover, pea, sweet potato, carrot, green pepper and pumpkin are rich in this vitamin. The other source is from animals. This particular type can be digested and used by the human body directly. It exists mainly in animal livers, milk and eggs. 

According to food analysis, every 100 grams of green vegetables contain about 12000 units of vitamin A. These include collard, spinach and mangle. And sword bean, broccoli, carrot, pumpkin, apricot, or yam can provide 5000 units, which are the exact amount for an adult per day. A portion of tomato, pea, celery, lettuce or asparagus can averagely offer near 2000 units. Except for apricot, most types of yellow fruits contain less than 400 units. However, those plants which the colors have faded or are not clean yet lack this vitamin.

From this analysis, we can easily find that animal livers are rich in this vitamin. So are animal kidneys. The muscles are not able to keep such vitamin. Barbecue and fried meat do not contain it, either. The amount of this vitamin in eggs and milk depends on the ingestion of animal itself. Every liter of milk contains 500 to 7000 units, with an average of 2000 units. Cod liver oil is the largest source of vitamin A in business. This amount of this vitamin in animal liver depends largely on the age and the food that particular animal ingests. Other than the livers of polar bears, the liver oil from the 100-year-old python in London Zoo was once considered to be the most precious source. The amount in halibut liver is higher than that in cod liver. It is because that halibut is usually older than cod when it is on the market. The halibut is old enough that it ingests much more green seaweeds. For the same reason, grown-up cattle and sheep have more than younger ones.