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. 1984 Oct;48(4):902–904. doi: 10.1128/aem.48.4.902-904.1984

Potential mutagenic activity of some vitamin preparations in the human gut.

J A Mader, I A Macdonald
PMCID: PMC241644  PMID: 6508299

Abstract

Rutin is a nonmutagenic flavonol glycoside, whereas its aglycone quercetin is mutagenic. Cell-free preparations from fecal cultures (fecal preparations) contain a beta-glucosidase that, when incubated with rutin, hydrolyzes it to quercetin. This activity can be further induced when rutin is added to the fecal culture from which the cell-free preparation is made. When vitamin pills that contain rutin are added to the cultures, this induction is equally effective. The vitamin extracts by themselves, like rutin, were nonmutagenic; however, when the vitamin extracts were incubated with fecal preparations containing induced beta-glucosidase, a great increase in mutagenicity was observed.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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