Naturally occurring and chemically modified
ribonucleosides have interesting bioactive effects. Dietary
ribonucleosides are ingested mainly as
nucleoproteins and are converted in the course of intestinal digestion to monomeric compounds. Different bioactive effects of dietary
ribonucleosides have been described, including the ability to enhance gut growth and maturation and to increase
iron absorption. Cytochemical studies with human cells showed that several
ribonucleosides can induce apoptosis in human cells, and therefore may be potentially anticancerogenic compounds. Even if suboptimal concentrations of single bioactive nucleo compounds are available from food, the total content of different bioactive
ribonucleosides may reach physiologically effective concentrations in vivo where intestinal cells may represent the main target sites of a selective apoptotic activity. Modified
ribonucleosides serve as valuable pathobiochemical marker molecules for
cancer. Chemically modified
ribonucleosides have already found interesting applications as pharmaceutically active compounds in the treatment of different illnesses including
AIDS. Regarding therapeutic and
pharmaceutical aspects, further studies are required to evaluate the bioactive efficacy of indigenous
ribonucleosides. The findings demonstrate the great variety of potential applications of
ribonucleosides, e.g. in functional foods as well as pharmaceutical preparations.