Table 1.

Carotenoid-related candidate gene

Name	Evidence for potential role in carotenoid deposition	Protein ID	Reference
ninaD	Responsible for carotenoid uptake in Drosophila and mutation leads to carotenoid deficient	AAO11676	[12]
SRB type I	Involved in the uptake of carotenoids; homologous to ninaD in Drosophila	NP_005496	[10]
Cameo2	Involved in selective absorption of lutein	BAI66272	[13]
CD36	Homologous to carotenoid-uptake gene Cameo2 and SCRB15 in Bombyx mori	NP_000063	[13,14]
Carotenoid binding protein (CBP)	Involved in lutein binding and transportation in B. mori	BAC01051	[17]
MLN64(STAR3)	Orthologue of B. mori CBP	NP_001159410	[16]
Crustacyanin	CBP in the carapace of crustaceans and binding astaxanthin	1GKA_B	[24]
BCDO	Lower expression levels lead to the retention of carotenoids and a yellow skin phenotype	ACA05952	[18,19]
BCMO	Lower activity leads to hypercarotenemia in human being	NP_059125	[20]
NPC1L1	Involved in intocopherol intestinal absorption using Caco-2 cells and in situ perfusions in rats. Lower expression levels inhibit the uptake of several carotenoids in Caco-2 cells.	NP_037521	[21]
GST	Binding carotenoid in the mammalian retina	AAH10915	[23]
ABCG5	A genetic variant in ABCG5 associate with plasma lutein concentration	NP_071881	[22]
RXR/RAR	Form heterodimers of RXR-RAR and regulate retinoid-responsive elements	RXR:NP_002948	[26]
		RAR:NP_000955
ISX	Gatekeeper that controls intestinal β, β-carotene absorption	NP_082113	[25]