Effects of Vitamin D Supplementation and Degradation on the Innate Immune System Response: Insights on SARS-CoV-2

Deborah Lacitignola, Fasma Diele, Carmela Marangi, Angela Monti (), Teresa Serini and Simonetta Vernocchi
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Deborah Lacitignola: Dipartimento di Ingegneria Elettrica e dell’Informazione, Università di Cassino e del Lazio Meridionale, Via Di Biasio, I-03043 Cassino, Italy
Fasma Diele: Istituto per le Applicazioni del Calcolo M. Picone, CNR, Via Amendola 122, I-70126 Bari, Italy
Carmela Marangi: Istituto per le Applicazioni del Calcolo M. Picone, CNR, Via Amendola 122, I-70126 Bari, Italy
Angela Monti: Istituto per le Applicazioni del Calcolo M. Picone, CNR, Via Amendola 122, I-70126 Bari, Italy
Teresa Serini: Faculty of Medicine, University of Ostrava, 703 00 Ostrava, Czech Republic
Simonetta Vernocchi: Faculty of Medicine, University of Ostrava, 703 00 Ostrava, Czech Republic

Mathematics, 2023, vol. 11, issue 17, 1-19

Abstract: Vitamin D has been proven to be a strong stimulator of mechanisms associated with the elimination of pathogens. Because of its recognized effectiveness against viral infections, during SARS-CoV-2 infection, the effects of Vitamin D supplementation have been the object of debate. This study aims to contribute to this debate by the means of a qualitative phenomenological mathematical model in which the role of Vitamin D and its interactions with the innate immune system are explicitly considered. We show that Vitamin D influx and degradation can be considered as possible control parameters for the disease evaluation and recovery. By varying Vitamin D influx, three dynamical scenarios have been found with different modalities of recovery from the disease. Inside each scenario, Vitamin D degradation has been related to different degrees of severity in disease development. Interestingly, the emergence of hysteretic phenomenologies when Vitamin D influx is too low can be related to the onset of Long-COVID syndrome, confirming clinical evidence from recent studies on the topic.

Keywords: nonlinear dynamical systems; Vitamin D; pathogen–innate immune system interaction; hysteretic phenomenology; COVID-19 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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