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Meta-Analysis
. 2014 Jun 5;510(7503):139-42.
doi: 10.1038/nature13179. Epub 2014 May 7.

Increasing CO2 threatens human nutrition

Samuel S Myers  1 , Antonella Zanobetti  2 , Itai Kloog  3 , Peter Huybers  4 , Andrew D B Leakey  5 , Arnold J Bloom  6 , Eli Carlisle  6 , Lee H Dietterich  7 , Glenn Fitzgerald  8 , Toshihiro Hasegawa  9 , N Michele Holbrook  10 , Randall L Nelson  11 , Michael J Ottman  12 , Victor Raboy  13 , Hidemitsu Sakai  9 , Karla A Sartor  14 , Joel Schwartz  2 , Saman Seneweera  15 , Michael Tausz  16 , Yasuhiro Usui  9
Affiliations
Meta-Analysis

Increasing CO2 threatens human nutrition

Samuel S Myers et al. Nature. .

Erratum in

  • Author Correction: Increasing CO2 threatens human nutrition.
    Myers SS, Zanobetti A, Kloog I, Huybers P, Leakey ADB, Bloom AJ, Carlisle E, Dietterich LH, Fitzgerald G, Hasegawa T, Holbrook NM, Nelson RL, Ottman MJ, Raboy V, Sakai H, Sartor KA, Schwartz J, Seneweera S, Tausz M, Usui Y. Myers SS, et al. Nature. 2019 Oct;574(7778):E14. doi: 10.1038/s41586-019-1602-8. Nature. 2019. PMID: 31576054

Abstract

Dietary deficiencies of zinc and iron are a substantial global public health problem. An estimated two billion people suffer these deficiencies, causing a loss of 63 million life-years annually. Most of these people depend on C3 grains and legumes as their primary dietary source of zinc and iron. Here we report that C3 grains and legumes have lower concentrations of zinc and iron when grown under field conditions at the elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration predicted for the middle of this century. C3 crops other than legumes also have lower concentrations of protein, whereas C4 crops seem to be less affected. Differences between cultivars of a single crop suggest that breeding for decreased sensitivity to atmospheric CO2 concentration could partly address these new challenges to global health.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Percent change in nutrient content at elevated [CO2] relative to ambient [CO2]
Percent change (95% Confidence Intervals) in nutrients at elevated [CO2] relative to ambient [CO2]. N refers to the number of comparisons where replicates of a particular cultivar grown at a specific site under one set of growing conditions in one year at elevated [CO2] have been pooled and mean nutrient values for these replicates are compared with mean values for identical cultivars under identical growing conditions except grown at ambient [CO2]. In most instances, data from four replicates were pooled for each value meaning that eight experiments were combined for each comparison (see Table 1 for details of experiments).
Figure 2
Figure 2. Percent change in nutrient content at elevated [CO2] relative to ambient [CO2] by cultivar for each of three nutrients
Percent change (95% Confidence Intervals) in zinc (A) iron (B) and protein (C) at elevated [CO2] relative to ambient [CO2] by cultivar.
Figure 2
Figure 2. Percent change in nutrient content at elevated [CO2] relative to ambient [CO2] by cultivar for each of three nutrients
Percent change (95% Confidence Intervals) in zinc (A) iron (B) and protein (C) at elevated [CO2] relative to ambient [CO2] by cultivar.
Figure 2
Figure 2. Percent change in nutrient content at elevated [CO2] relative to ambient [CO2] by cultivar for each of three nutrients
Percent change (95% Confidence Intervals) in zinc (A) iron (B) and protein (C) at elevated [CO2] relative to ambient [CO2] by cultivar.
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