AUTHOR=Suidasari Sofya , Stautemas Jan , Uragami Shinji , Yanaka Noriyuki , Derave Wim , Kato Norihisa TITLE=Carnosine Content in Skeletal Muscle Is Dependent on Vitamin B6 Status in Rats JOURNAL=Frontiers in Nutrition VOLUME=2 YEAR=2016 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/nutrition/articles/10.3389/fnut.2015.00039 DOI=10.3389/fnut.2015.00039 ISSN=2296-861X ABSTRACT=
Carnosine, a histidine-containing dipeptide, is well known to be associated with skeletal muscle performance. However, there is limited information on the effect of dietary micronutrients on muscle carnosine level. Pyridoxal 5′-phosphate (PLP), the active form of vitamin B6, is involved in amino acid metabolisms in the body as a cofactor. We hypothesized that enzymes involved in β-alanine biosynthesis, the rate-limiting precursor of carnosine, may also be PLP dependent. Thus, we examined the effects of dietary vitamin B6 on the muscle carnosine content of rats. Male and female rats were fed a diet containing 1, 7, or 35 mg pyridoxine (PN) HCl/kg for 6 weeks. Carnosine in skeletal muscles was quantified by ultra-performance liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry. In the gastrocnemius muscle of male rats, carnosine concentration was significantly higher in the 7 and 35 mg groups (+70 and +61%, respectively) than in the 1 mg PN HCl/kg group, whereas that in the soleus muscle of male rats was significantly higher only in the 7 mg group (+43%) than in the 1 mg PN HCl/kg group (