Thiamine atau juga dikenal sebagai vitamin B1, adalah senyawa tak berwarna dengan

rumus kimia C12H17N4OS. Thiamine larut dalam air dan tidak larut dalam alkohol.
Tiamin akan membusuk jika dipanaskan. Thiamine pertama kali ditemukan oleh
Umetaro Suzuki di Jepang saat meneliti bagaimana padi dapat menyembuhkan pasien
beriberi. Tiamin tidak bisa disimpan di dalam tubuh; Namun, setelah diserap, vitamin
terkonsentrasi di jaringan otot. Thiamine termasuk dalam keluarga vitamin B,
dengan efek antioksidan, eritropoietik, modulasi suasana hati, dan aktivitas pengatur
glukosa.

Thiamine bereaksi dengan adenosine triphosphate (ATP) untuk membentuk koenzim

aktif, thiamine pyrophospate.. Thiamine pyrophosphate diperlukan untuk proses
piruvat dehidrogenase dan alfa-ketoglutarate dalam metabolisme karbohidrat dan
untuk proses transketolase, enzim yang berperan penting dalam jalur pentosa fosfat.

Tiamin memainkan peran penting dalam metabolisme glukosa intraselular dan dapat
menghambat kerja glukosa dan insulin pada proliferasi sel otot polos arteri. Tiamin
juga melindungi toksisitas timbal dengan menghambat peroksidasi lipid akibat
timbal.1

1. Dutta B, Huang W, Molero M, Kekuda R, Leibach FH, Devoe LD, Ganapathy V,

Prasad PD: Cloning of the human thiamine transporter, a member of the folate
transporter family. J Biol Chem. 1999 Nov 5;274(45):31925-9

Thiamine passively absorbed in the small intestine at high concentrations or actively

absorbed through thiamine transporter proteins at lower concentrations. It exists in
multiple forms through the addition of one or more phosphate groups. These include
the nonphosphorylated or free thiamine, thiamine monophosphate (TMP), TPP or
diphosphate (TPP) and thiamine triphosphate (TTP) (Figure 1).

The human adult can store around 30 mg of thiamine in muscle tissue, liver and
kidneys [1]. These stores can however become depleted in as little as 18 days after the
cessation of thiamine intake [2, 3]. This leads to a variety of clinical features that are
often vague and sometimes non-specific [4–6].

Physiology of thiamine

The distribution of thiamine compounds in the body varies considerably. After

ingestion, free thiamine is converted to TPP by thiamine pyrophosphokinase and is
then utilised by numerous metabolic pathways as a cofactor. TPP can also be further
phosphorylated or dephosphorylated to form any of the thiamine compounds (Figure
1). Gangolf et al. [40] and Tallaksen et al. [41] conducted extensive studies on human
cells and body fluids which Determined that the most abundant intracellular thiamine
species was TPP. TMP and free thiamine were the only detectable species in the
extracellular fluid. The majority of TPP in the body is found in erythrocytes and
accounts for approximately 80% of the total bodies stores [14, 42–44]. There is no
consensus on reference intervals for thiamine compounds in the human body. As an
example published reference intervals for whole-blood TPP range from a lower limit
of 63–105 nmol/L to an upper limit of 171–229 nmol/L [40, 41, 45–48]. Reference
intervals for the less abundant compounds in whole blood and serum have also been
established each with similar variations in their lower and upper limits [40–42, 45,
47–49]. Clinical practise publications related to nutritional supplementation state that
patients with suspected or at risk of developing TD should be provided with thiamine
[50–52]. Malnutrition (starvation or reduced intake, increased loss or impaired
absorption), alcoholism, bariatric surgery, refeeding, congestive heart failure, lactic
acidosis, neuropathy, renal failure with dialysis and the critically ill are all risk factors
for the development of TD. However, there is no consensus on the dose, frequency or
duration of supplementation. For mild symptoms, 20 mg a day up to 100 mg 2 or 3
times a day has been suggested.

More advanced symptoms include intravenous doses of 50 mg a day to >500 mg

twice a day. These recommendations are dependent on the risk factor, with alcoholism
and bariatric surgery calling for higher frequency and larger doses, as there is the
potential of impaired absorption, compared to cardiac and renal failure. Thiamine’s
function as a cofactor, in the form of its diphosphate ester TPP, is the most broadly
recognised physiological role. TPP is a cofactor for numerous enzymatic reactions
including pyruvate dehydrogenase (PDH), transketolase, α-ketogluterate
dehydrogenase (KGDH) and branched-chain α-keto acid dehydrogenase (BCKDH) [9,
53–55]. Its involvement in these metabolic pathways and its intracellular abundance
has made TPP a popular analyte for assessing thiamine status. However, there are also
proposed non-cofactor roles of thiamine compounds within the immune system, gene
regulation, oxidative stress response, cholinergic activity, chloride channels and
neurotransmission [8, 56–61].