Addressing Vitamin B12 deficiency through aeroponic fortification of a salad crop (Pisum sativum)

Plants do not produce Vitamin B12, creating a nutrient insufficiency risk for those who do not consume animal-derived foods without supplementation. Furthermore, various diseases cause Vitamin B12 deficiency. Here, we establish an approach for B12 dietary supplementation that harnesses a horticultural technology to deliver the recommended daily allowance (RDA) of B12 within a single portion of a salad crop (pea shoots). We demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach in a commercial and scalable growing environment, conducted an economic evaluation, find that it has versatility for growers, does not alter the product shelf-life, and that the B12 persists during cold-chain storage. Furthermore, the RDA of B12 is bioaccessible from this crop during simulated human digestion. Taken together, this provides a commercially-viable approach for dietary supplementation of B12 intake, and a roadmap for the development and evaluation of fortification strategies.