[Role of zinc deficiency in the etiology of neural tube malformations].

The authors study the hypothesis of zinc deficiency as an etiology of malformations of the neural tube. This hypothesis is based on several facts: decrease of maternal zinc levels in this disease found by many authors, malformations of the neural tube induced by experimental deficiency in several animal species, zinc membrane transfer disorders found in fibroblasts cultures in affected newborns. Numerous zinc related biochemical mechanisms could explain this effect. But the most interesting would a disturbance of folate metabolism. In fact, neither a strict isolated zinc deficiency nor a strict folate deficiency can clearly explain these malformations. On the contrary, an interaction, genetic as well as nutritional, between these nutrients would explain these anomalies.