Vitamins in nutrition

Abstract

The subject for my contribution to this symposium covers a very wide field. For its adequate treatment a long course of carefully prepared lectures would be necessary. With half an hour at my disposal, therefore, the problem of making the best selection from the wealth of material available is very difficult. In view of the purpose of this meeting, however, it may be appropriate for me to divide my talk roughly into two parts. The first part will deal, in reasonable detail and with the citing of appropriate references, to the contributions made by Hopkins to our knowledge of the vitamins. In the second part I shall try to review our knowledge of the vitamins, as it stands today. My treatment here will consist of little more than the brief display of tables listing the vitamins, with passing allusions to such points of special interest as time permits. This second part of my talk will be neither systematic nor comprehensive, and citations of the literature will only be made when there are associations with Hopkins. My apologies are therefore due to all my fellow workers in the vitamin field, past and present, who cannot here be given credit for their important contributions. As we are celebrating a centenary it is fitting, perhaps, that we should first reflect on the inevitable passage of time, a matter which affects us all. It may surprise some of you, as it certainly surprised me, to realize that Hopkins was born in the year of the outbreak of the Civil War in North America. He was in the toddler stage, therefore, and presumably able to talk, at the time of President Lincoln’s famous speech at Gettysburg. From that time we may skip over nearly half a century to come to the auspicious meeting of the Society of Public Analysts, held in the Chemical Society’s Booms, Burlington House, on 7 November 1906 (Hopkins 1906). Dr Harris has already referred to this meeting, so I need not add much more. I may mention, however, that the prophetic utterances about the substances we now know as vitamins only occupied about the last quarter of the lecture, which was mainly concerned with interrelationships between the duties of public analysts and medical officers of health. The discussion seems to have been long and lively, but only a Mr F. J. Lloyd commented on the part of the lecture dealing with nutrition. He pointed out that Barlow’s disease, or infantile scurvy, could be caused by a diet of boiled, rather than fresh cow’s milk. Presumably the chemical differences between boiled and unboiled milk were very slight, and their investigation would probably require some years of very careful work, at great pecuniary expense. Could any analyst dependent for his income on analytical practice be expected to give the necessary time and money to such a research ? Mr Lloyd suggested that university professors should be appointed to investigate such recondite problems.