Scientists use your genes to guess how much vitamin D you’ve had over your life, and since these genes don’t change much as you grow, they can help estimate your vitamin D levels even when you were a kid—even though the data was collected from adults.

People who naturally have more vitamin D in their blood tend to be taller as adults, and this link comes from our genes—not because vitamin D makes you grow taller, but because the same genes that affect vitamin D also affect how tall you get.

Scientists found that three tiny differences in a person’s DNA, all in the same gene, are linked to how much vitamin D they naturally have in their body when they’re healthy and between 50 and 74 years old.

People who naturally have more vitamin D in their blood tend to be a tiny bit taller as adults—like a small nudge in height—not much, but it’s a real pattern scientists noticed.

People with certain inherited gene differences that affect how their body uses vitamin D tend to be taller or shorter as adults, which suggests that having the right amount of vitamin D over a lifetime might help bones grow better than taking vitamin D pills for a short time.

People who naturally have more vitamin D in their blood tend to be a tiny bit taller as adults—like a small nudge in height—because their bodies have had more vitamin D throughout life.