Great Discovery on Vitamin C Synthesis in Bats

In the past fifty years many scientists had taken for granted that bats as well as people and rats, can not synthesize Vitamin C by themselves. However, recent discovery challenged this idea.

 

The lost of the ability to synthesize Vitamin C is rare. The reason why people and rats cannot synthesize it is that L-gulonolactone oxidase (GULO) cannot be synthesized.

 

Pseudo-genization sequence is similar to the real, but due to genetic mutation, some of the genes are defunctioned. Thus, L-gulonolactone oxidase (GULO) can hardly be made.

 

Our researchers discovered that Rousettus leschenaultia and Hipposideros armiger have complete GULO genes, and further explored that they can synthesize Vitamin C in a very small amount.

 

The result has been published on Molecular Biology and Evolution on October 29th, 2010, titled “Progressive Pseudogenization: Vitamin C Synthesis and Its Loss in Bats”. Its first authors are our Dr. Cui Jie and Post-doc Pan Yixuan. Our Professor Zhang Shuyi is its correspondence author.

 

(Translated and Edited by Shui Tao. Email: tao.shui0430@gmail.com)