I know that you can’t eat stuff made of iron, but I don’t know WHY you can’t just eat iron stuff. I know iron supplements exist how is that different?
In: Biology
It’s the same atoms, but in different chemical compounds.
A regular chunk of iron is crystals of pure iron and iron oxide; very stable, not water-soluble, so your body can’t break away individual atoms efficiently to use them.
Iron in food and supplements is torn away from the crystal in a “mobile” form, typically salts (attached to an acid) or part of a protein (in use by another organism). Salts are often water-soluble, proteins are digestible, so your body has no issue extracting and using this form of iron.
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