4.1: Essential Nutrients
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To be classified as an essential nutrient, a substance must be shown to be needed in the diet for health and normal development and reproduction. This definition has been useful for including or excluding substances that have been proposed as essential nutrients, but it does present a few problems.
Vitamin D, for example, can be made in the skin when exposed to sunshine (ultraviolet light). Thus, many of us don’t need vitamin D in our diet. But those who don’t get enough from sun exposure do need dietary vitamin D. As another example, most of us don’t need vitamin K in our diet because we get enough by absorbing vitamin K made by intestinal bacteria. However, we need vitamin K in our diet when not enough is made—as can happen if we take antibiotics for a long time (antibiotics can kill intestinal bacteria that make vitamin K).
We need energy (calories), protein, specific molecules that the body can’t make (vitamins and certain amino acids and fatty acids), and certain elements (required minerals). These are listed in Table 4-1.