Experts Develop Vitamin D-enriched Tomatoes

Researchers from Norwich Research Park and partners successfully engineered biofortified tomatoes using gene editing. Their findings are published in Nature Plants.

Poor vitamin D in diets is a health concern worldwide. Vitamin D insufficiency increases the risk of cancer, neurocognitive decline, and all-cause mortality. The majority of food sources lack or do not have vitamin D. This concern led the research team to use gene editing tools to build up the formation of provitamin D₃ in tomatoes.

The researchers modified a duplicated section of phytosterol biosynthesis in the tomato plants considering the possibility of supplement production from waste material. Confirmatory tests were conducted to ensure the efficacy of the biofortification strategy. They also found that the amount of vitamin D₃ in the ripe fruit can be boosted more through sun-drying.

Read the open-access article in Nature Plants.