Oral vitamin D rapidly attenuates inflammation from sunburn: an interventional study
Open accessAbstract
The diverse immunomodulatory effects of vitamin D are increasingly being recognized. However, the ability of oral vitamin D to modulate acute inflammation in vivo has not been established in humans. In a double-blinded, placebo-controlled interventional trial, 20 healthy adults were randomized to receive either placebo or a high dose of vitamin D 3 (cholecalciferol) one hour after experimental sunburn induced by an erythemogenic dose of UVR. Compared with placebo, participants receiving vitamin D 3 (200,000 international units) demonstrated reduced expression of proinflammatory mediators tumor necrosis factor-α ( P = 0.04) and inducible nitric oxide synthase ( P = 0.02) in skin biopsy specimens 48 hours after experimental sunburn. A blinded, unsupervised hierarchical clustering of participants based on global gene expression profiles revealed that participants with significantly higher serum vitamin D 3 levels after treatment ( P = 0.007) demonstrated increased skin expression of the anti-inflammatory mediator arginase-1 ( P = 0.005), and a sustained reduction in skin redness ( P = 0.02), correlating with significant expression of genes related to skin barrier repair. In contrast, participants with lower serum vitamin D 3 levels had significant expression of proinflammatory genes. Together the data may have broad implications for the immunotherapeutic properties of vitamin D in skin homeostasis, and implicate arginase-1 upregulation as a previously unreported mechanism by which vitamin D exerts anti-inflammatory effects in humans.
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Clinical studies have shown that skin treatments with both oral and topical vitamin D3 protect against UV-induced inflammation and sunburn.
“Furthermore, clinical studies have shown that skin treatments with both oral and topical vitamin D3 protect against UV-induced inflammation and sunburn [100,101].”
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- Authors
- Scott, J. F., Das, L. M., Ahsanuddin, S., Qiu, Y., Binko, A. M., Traylor, Z. P., Debanne, S. M., Cooper, K. D., Boxer, R., & Lu, K. Q.
- Affiliations
- University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center (US)
- Case Western Reserve University (US)
- University Hospitals of Cleveland (US)
- University of Colorado Anschutz (US)
- Corresponding author
- Lu, Kurt Q.
- Venue
- Journal of Investigative Dermatology
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2017-10
- Volume
- 137
- Issue
- 10
- Pages
- 2078-2086
- ISSN
- 0022-202X (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC5610950
- OpenAlex
- W2605783229
- Cited by
- 95
- References
- 32
- Citations by year
- 2026: 7 · 2025: 7 · 2024: 11 · 2023: 12 · 2022: 11 · 2021: 9 · 2020: 15 · 2019: 11 · 2018: 9 · 2017: 3
- FWCI
- 8.16
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Journal of Investigative Dermatology (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- eScholarship (California Digital Library) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (T32AR007569, P30AR039750, U01AR064144)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Pathology and Forensic Medicine › Vitamin D Research Studies
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Dermatology › Skin Protection and Aging
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Dermatology › Dermatology and Skin Diseases
- Keywords
- vitamin D3, sunburn, ultraviolet radiation, TNF-α, inducible nitric oxide synthase, arginase-1, skin barrier repair, serum vitamin D levels, skin redness, gene expression profiling, anti-inflammatory activity
- MeSH terms
- Administration, Oral, Adult, Cholecalciferol, Dose-Response Relationship, Drug, Double-Blind Method, Female, Follow-Up Studies, Humans, Inflammation, Male, Middle Aged, Skin, Sunburn, Time Factors, Vitamins, Treatment Outcome, Young Adult
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