Biofortification—Advances in Functional Food Research II

Dear Colleagues,

There is no doubt that our health depends mainly on the quality of our food. When the food a person consumes lacks certain critical macro- or micronutrients, they are more likely to get sick. This is a topic of increasing concern today, especially as more and more people are switching to plant-based diets, and it has been determined that plant-based foods may not contain enough minerals. One reason for the low content of nutrients in plants is the deficiency of these nutrients in the soils where crops are grown. This deficiency results from removing elements with plant yield, insufficient fertilization, and limitation of the introduction of ingredients into the environment from industrial sources. Elements present in soils can also occur in forms that are difficult to absorb and inaccessible to plants. Growing crops with high yields is also not conducive to accumulating large amounts of elements.

Biofortification is a promising approach to enriching our diet with specific nutrients. It is a method of plant breeding and production, whose goal is to enhance the nutritional value of a product by supplementing it with bioavailable nutrients such as calcium (Ca), copper (Cu), iron (Fe), iodine (I), magnesium (Mg), selenium (Se) or zinc (Zn), which are present in the natural human diet in a small amount. In other words, food produced through biofortification has an additional positive effect on health over and above the biological nutritional value. The aim is for consumption of these improved foods to reduce the occurrence of diseases caused by elemental deficiencies.

Therefore, in this Special Issue, articles (original research papers, perspectives, hypotheses, opinions, reviews, modelling approaches, and methods) that focus on biofortification and production of functional food such as whole plant studies, field trials, and agronomics in model plants, crop plants, trees, aquatic plants, native species, and mushrooms are most welcome.

I encourage you to submit your valuable results.

Dr. Sylwia Budzynska
Guest Editor

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• biofortification
• functional food
• diet enrichment
• nutritional value
• supplementation
• elemental deficiencies