Health Significance of Insufficient Dietary Choline During the Human Lifecycle
A special issue of Nutrients (ISSN 2072-6643). This special issue belongs to the section "Micronutrients and Human Health".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 25 September 2025 | Viewed by 349
Special Issue Editor
Interests: critical nutrients; choline; essential fatty acids; lipid metabolism; cystic fibrosis; preterm infant nutrition; stable isotope labeling in vivo
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Choline has been approved as an essential nutrient, particularly important to liver development and function, in 1998, 2016, and 2023 by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), respectively. For decades, researchers and clinicians have defined the roles of choline in development, homeostasis, and health care. Compared to veterinary medicine and animal breeding, where choline is intensely investigated and applied to promote the growth and health of farm animals, the findings on choline’s universal relevance have so far had no impact on clinical medicine. This means choline’s relevance to (1) parenchymal growth and maintenance, (2) one-carbon metabolism including epigenetics, and (3) its interrelation with vitamins (folate and cobalamin) and polyunsaturated fatty acids (arachidonic and docosahexaenoic acid) has not gained broad attention. Hence, larger clinical trials are still missing. This applies to (1) preterm infant development; disturbed enterohepatic cycles of bile (phosphatidyl)choline (2) in patients with exocrine pancreatic insufficient cystic fibrosis or (3) short bowel disease and small intestinal bacterial overgrowth; and (4) total parenteral nutrition (TPN) receiving regimens devoid of free choline. Additionally, (5) choline deficiency due to inferior nutrition habits and (6) genetic heterogeneity in endogenous choline synthesis by phosphatidylethanolamine-N-methyl transferase (PEMT) may impact clinical medicine. In this Special Issue, the (potential or verified) critical role of choline will be evaluated, with special focus on preterm infants, cystic fibrosis, TPN, and short bowel disease.
Dr. Wolfgang Bernhard
Guest Editor
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Keywords
- pregnancy
- preterm infants
- fetal development
- cystic fibrosis
- short bowel disease
- genetic variability
- choline deficiency
- hepatosteatosis
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