How Iron Is So Important In Our Everyday Diet

In BIS 102, we have discussed about hemoglobin, myoglobin, their structure, and their functionality. However, we have not really related the information into real life situation. Therefore, this paper will illustrate their nutritional aspect and how iron is so important in our daily diet. Myoglobin can be found in blood and its job is to store oxygen until our body needs it. Meanwhile, hemoglobin is also in blood, but its functionality is to transport oxygen through blood vessels from our lungs to our tissues, providing our organs oxygen so that they can do their jobs. Furthermore, both myoglobin and hemoglobin contain iron in their structure since iron is the main active molecule for the binding with oxygen molecules. In fact, 70% of the iron in our body is in myoglobin and hemoglobin (1). As a result, our daily iron intake can dramatically affect our body and our ability to function properly. …show more content…
Iron deficiency has been a problem worldwide, including the United States since the average American diet does not provide enough essential nutrients for proper functionality (2). When there is not enough iron for the production of hemoglobin, people will feel abnormally tired throughout the day, their breath gets shorten, and some people may feel dizzy (3). This is due to not enough oxygen bind to hemoglobin or myoglobin to transport and store oxygen for our body, causing tiredness. Moreover, severe iron deficiency can cause iron deficiency anemia, which means your body does not product enough hemoglobin and myoglobin, affecting the functionality of many organ systems (4). Young children, pregnant women are usually the victims of iron deficiency because of the rapid growth and the higher need of iron in their body (2). Therefore, a good nutritional diet is much required in order for our body to function at its