Home > RESEARCH > Vitamins & Antioxidants > Niacin and nutrients from food, not supplements, may help protect airline pilots from DNA damage due to radiation.

Niacin and nutrients from food – not supplements – may help protect airline pilots from DNA damage due to radiation. In this featured study published in the British Journal of Nutrition, researchers sought to determine possible associations between B vitamins and DNA damage due to ionising radiation (IR), an established carcinogen which airline pilots are exposed to at elevated levels. IR is known to cause DNA damage and is measured by way of the frequency of “translocations”; which are established biomarkers for chromosome aberrations. Yong and Peterson note previous research on the protective effects on translocation frequency due to specific fruits and vegetables and high dietary intakes of vitamin C, b-carotene, b-cryptozanthin, lutein-zeaxanthin and vitamin E. This is the first study to examine B vitamins and their food sources relative to translocation frequency in pilots. Notably, Yong and Peterson did not observe any significant associations between translocation frequency and higher total (food and supplement fortification) intake of folate, vitamin B12, B6 and riboflavin. While an inverse association was observed for total niacin intake (food and supplements) it was only the food sourced intake of niacin alone that demonstrated a statistically significant protective effect. Similarly just as niacin from food was inversely related to translocation frequency it appears that other B vitamins and compounds from whole food sources may also be involved in the protective associations observed. Investigators noted, for instance, that refined grains (which are fortified with synthetically derived B vitamins) showed no significant association with the frequency of translocations; yet whole grains were associated with a 30% reduction. Red and processed meats were associated with a significantly increased translocation frequency. Given the variances in results based on the sources of B vitamins (supplements, refined grains, whole grains & processed meat) Yong and Peterson state “there is a possibility that the present results for the dietary intakes of the B vitamins may be attributed to other nutrients as well as protective or harmful factors for similar foods.” The only statistically significant decreases in translocation frequency observed in this study were among pilots consuming high intakes of niacin from food (not high intakes due to supplements), and among pilots consuming diets high in whole grains (not refined grains). Based on their findings, Yong and Peterson suggest niacin from food as well as a diet high in whole grains may protect pilots against “IR-induced cumulative DNA damage.” Study: Yong, L. C., Peterson, M. R., British Journal of Nutrition (2010)

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