Folate, vitamin B12, homocysteine status and DNA damage in young Australian adults

What Was Tested

The paper reports a study of Cyanocobalamin (Vitamin B12), published as a randomized controlled trial.

The researchers performed a cross-sectional study (n = 49 males, 57 females) and a randomized double-blind placebo-controlled dietary intervention study (n = 31/32 per group) to determine the effect of folate and vitamin B12 (B12) on DNA damage (micronucleus formation and DNA methylation) and plasma homocysteine (HC) in young Australian adults aged 18-32 years.

Why It Was Studied

The dietary intervention involved supplementation with 3.5x the recommended dietary intake (RDI) of folate and vitamin B12 in wheat bran cereal for three months followed by ten times the RDI of these vitamins via tablets for a further three months.

Who Took Part

The age groups tagged for this paper are adults, both men and women.

How the Study Was Run

In design terms this was a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study.

Random assignment meant chance, not the researchers, decided who got Cyanocobalamin (Vitamin B12) and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

Neither the participants nor the staff measuring them knew who was on Cyanocobalamin (Vitamin B12), so expectations could not easily colour the readings.

A placebo (an inactive look-alike) gave the Cyanocobalamin (Vitamin B12) group a baseline to be compared against.

The timeline in the abstract includes three months.

What Was Measured

Topics PubMed links to this paper include Chromosome Aberrations, Cross-Sectional Studies, DNA, DNA Damage, DNA Methylation, Dietary Supplements and Folic Acid.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Cyanocobalamin (Vitamin B12) over three months.

The publication is from 1998 (Carcinogenesis), a journal based in England.

More context: the Cyanocobalamin (Vitamin B12) compound page, all human trials.