Role of Zinc, Copper and Selenium in Nutritional Anemia

Abstract

Zinc is an essential trace element necessary for a broad category of enzymatic reactions, enzymes, transcription factors and proteins of the body. It is of prime importance in prenatal and postnatal growth and development. It is profoundly involved in normal endocrine functioning, sexual maturation and development of immunity. Its deficiency in the body either during intrauterine or postnatal life is responsible for recurrent infection of upper respiratory tract, diarrhoea, wasting and stunting in children. Zinc essentially regulates the process of erythropoiesis in the bone marrow. Zinc is the key component of GATA-1, also called as erythroid transcription factor. Zinc is required in different stages of erythropoiesis. Hypocupremia is responsible for dysregulation of human pluripotent stem cell proliferation and/or an impediment in the cellular differentiation in the bone marrow. Copper deficiency anemia in children is typical of microcytic or normocytic or macrocytic with neutropenia and thrombocytopenia as the main characteristics. Selenium is an important component of glutathione peroxidase, and its concentration in erythrocytes shows its protective effect on erythrocytes against oxidative damage. This suggests that increased oxidative stress could be another contributing factor for the development of anemia due to selenium deficiency.