1 00:00:00,012 --> 00:00:07,094 When we think about Nutritional Science, we don't always stop to think about how 2 00:00:07,094 --> 00:00:12,544 we got here or who helped us gain the knowledge we have today. 3 00:00:12,544 --> 00:00:19,705 Diseasees associated with nutritional deficiency were actually documented as 4 00:00:19,705 --> 00:00:24,421 far back as 2600 BC. Influxes of nutritional disease have 5 00:00:24,421 --> 00:00:30,115 occurred throughout history often in relation to the economic status of a 6 00:00:30,115 --> 00:00:33,634 region. To put it simply, if we could eat well 7 00:00:33,634 --> 00:00:37,362 nutritional deficiencies were less prevalent. 8 00:00:37,362 --> 00:00:43,044 Conflicting theories and limited models help to slow the progress of nutritional 9 00:00:43,044 --> 00:00:48,149 discovery, but in the end science did find out what you do not eat may kill 10 00:00:48,149 --> 00:00:50,923 you. To begin the discussion of vitamin 11 00:00:50,923 --> 00:00:56,449 deficiency discovery, we must first consider the theories that helped medical 12 00:00:56,449 --> 00:01:00,472 science but may have hindered nutritional discovery. 13 00:01:00,472 --> 00:01:07,766 Early researchers believes that one could design a perfect diet based on chemical 14 00:01:07,766 --> 00:01:09,835 content alone. And Dr. 15 00:01:09,835 --> 00:01:17,342 Louis Pasteur's work in bacteriology helped actually promote medical advances, 16 00:01:17,342 --> 00:01:22,567 but limited the idea that it wasn't something that was infecting you causing 17 00:01:22,567 --> 00:01:25,817 disease, but it was something that was missing. 18 00:01:25,817 --> 00:01:30,717 The word vitamin didn't even enter our vocabulary until the early 1900s. 19 00:01:30,717 --> 00:01:36,142 Before the chance before researchers got the chance to duke it out over their 20 00:01:36,142 --> 00:01:39,872 theory. Epidemiological evidence did exist that 21 00:01:39,872 --> 00:01:44,922 diet may be related to disease. You eat something, you get better, 22 00:01:44,922 --> 00:01:48,122 that's a really easy research study to do. 23 00:01:48,122 --> 00:01:54,202 And people were dying from nutritional deficiencies, but nutrition science did 24 00:01:54,202 --> 00:01:57,462 not really advance until the early 1900's. 25 00:01:57,462 --> 00:02:01,042 Thiamin is recognized as the oldest vitamin. 26 00:02:01,042 --> 00:02:07,151 And it was the first to be discovered Beriberi a disease that results from 27 00:02:07,151 --> 00:02:12,646 thiamine deficiency was documented as far back as 2600 B C in China. 28 00:02:12,646 --> 00:02:19,200 The disease was noted to be prevalent in barracks and prison and increased when 29 00:02:19,200 --> 00:02:24,287 brown rice was replaced with polished or white rice. 30 00:02:24,287 --> 00:02:30,989 Early researchers in the 1880s thought that perhaps there was something wrong 31 00:02:30,989 --> 00:02:36,577 with the foods, a toxin. And they observed that navy sailors were 32 00:02:36,577 --> 00:02:42,332 spared death by Beriberi. When their primarily white rice ration 33 00:02:42,332 --> 00:02:47,849 was bolstered by other foods. Initial hypotheses from those are, were 34 00:02:47,849 --> 00:02:52,197 that it was some protein, so they're adding more foods. 35 00:02:52,197 --> 00:02:56,897 It must have been some protein that were curing Beriberi. 36 00:02:56,897 --> 00:03:03,583 A Dutch researcher, Christian Eijkman, observed that symptoms of Beriberi looked 37 00:03:03,583 --> 00:03:08,042 similar to a condition in chickens called polyneuritis. 38 00:03:08,042 --> 00:03:13,713 And in some early research with these chickens, as you can see here, he fed 39 00:03:13,713 --> 00:03:19,517 different chickens different diets. He found that sick chickens got better 40 00:03:19,517 --> 00:03:24,658 when they ate brown rice. And healthy chickens didn't get sick when 41 00:03:24,658 --> 00:03:29,344 they ate brown rice. But sick chickens and healthy chickens 42 00:03:29,344 --> 00:03:33,984 alike, died from Polyneuritis, when they were fed the white rice. 43 00:03:33,984 --> 00:03:38,963 So his first hypothesis that was, first his, his first thoughts was that in that 44 00:03:38,963 --> 00:03:43,754 white rice must have been some toxin. Again, we're thinking about bacteria, 45 00:03:43,754 --> 00:03:48,664 we're thinking it might be an infection, it must be something that's in it, not 46 00:03:48,664 --> 00:03:54,102 something that's missing. Later, a series of researchers, including 47 00:03:54,102 --> 00:03:57,054 Dr. Grijns, Captain Vedder, Mr. 48 00:03:57,054 --> 00:04:02,707 Chamberlain, and Dr. Casimir Funk, helped advance science and 49 00:04:02,707 --> 00:04:08,660 learn a little bit more about thiamin. They deduced that it was actually a 50 00:04:08,660 --> 00:04:14,092 missing component, not this idea that there was an infectious agent leading to 51 00:04:14,092 --> 00:04:19,755 Beriberi and discovered that something about rice polishings, the holes of rice, 52 00:04:19,755 --> 00:04:24,752 what we take away when we make white rice, was preventing the condition. 53 00:04:24,752 --> 00:04:30,914 And people are actually treated this way. We feed them rice polishings, and they 54 00:04:30,914 --> 00:04:33,977 get better. They don't get Beriberi. 55 00:04:33,977 --> 00:04:39,376 And it was Casimir Funk that actually isolated this vital amine, found 56 00:04:39,376 --> 00:04:45,578 thiamine, and vitamins were born. Another B vitamin, the compound Niacin, 57 00:04:45,578 --> 00:04:49,632 was actually recognized by chemists since 1867. 58 00:04:49,632 --> 00:04:53,598 And Mr. Funk, he actually did isolate it back in 59 00:04:53,598 --> 00:05:00,522 1911, but he was looking for the cure for Beriberi and Niacin didn't do the trick. 60 00:05:00,522 --> 00:05:06,632 Niacin, like thiamine is associated with another disease called Pellagra. 61 00:05:06,632 --> 00:05:12,475 Pellagra was actually first considered to be a disease of a corn consuming 62 00:05:12,475 --> 00:05:16,158 population. As corn consumption spread across the 63 00:05:16,158 --> 00:05:20,252 U.S., and even when it came to the U.S. pellagra followed. 64 00:05:20,252 --> 00:05:25,076 It was prevalent in the late 1700s and entire hospitals were actually 65 00:05:25,076 --> 00:05:28,783 established just to treat pellagra. Here in the U.S. 66 00:05:28,783 --> 00:05:33,582 we had a pellagra hospital. It was mostly associated with lower 67 00:05:33,582 --> 00:05:39,077 income populations, particularly with prisons and orphanages. 68 00:05:39,077 --> 00:05:45,417 As we look through history at economy and actually cotton, we can see changes in 69 00:05:45,417 --> 00:05:49,202 pellagra. Towards the end of the war, as cotton 70 00:05:49,202 --> 00:05:53,484 prices went up. Cotton farmers made more money, they got 71 00:05:53,484 --> 00:05:58,464 to eat better, pellegra disappeared and hospitals actually shut down. 72 00:05:58,464 --> 00:06:03,753 But once cotton prices fell, when the farmers where less able to buy healthy 73 00:06:03,753 --> 00:06:08,955 foods, pellagra reappeared. Over time, as cotton was no longer a 74 00:06:08,955 --> 00:06:15,051 valuable crop and farmer's started growing food crops, and therefore they 75 00:06:15,051 --> 00:06:18,747 also ate better, pellagra also disappeared. 76 00:06:18,747 --> 00:06:24,040 But still, people thought there must be some infectious agent. 77 00:06:24,040 --> 00:06:29,862 But a researcher named Goldberger was the first to question this theory, just like 78 00:06:29,862 --> 00:06:33,886 his predecessors with thiamine. Dr Goldberger was charged with 79 00:06:33,886 --> 00:06:39,120 identifying the germ that was causing pellagra, even though he didn't think it 80 00:06:39,120 --> 00:06:42,627 was a germ. He recognized that yes, in prisons and in 81 00:06:42,627 --> 00:06:47,942 dirty conditions Pellagra was rampant, but the guards did not have pellagra. 82 00:06:47,942 --> 00:06:51,103 Yes, in orphanages even, he was seen pellagra. 83 00:06:51,103 --> 00:06:55,671 But the children in the middle age group were the ones most affected. 84 00:06:55,671 --> 00:07:00,733 Those children, couldn't go out and work and earn more money eat a little bit 85 00:07:00,733 --> 00:07:03,474 better. They were also not given milk because 86 00:07:03,474 --> 00:07:08,597 they were old enough to eat other things. So if this was infectious why wasn't 87 00:07:08,597 --> 00:07:13,262 everybody getting it? So if you've ever not liked an assignment you've given, 88 00:07:13,262 --> 00:07:17,663 been given by a professor or your mentor gave you a project you weren't too 89 00:07:17,663 --> 00:07:21,643 thrilled with, think about Goldbergers' graduates students. 90 00:07:21,643 --> 00:07:27,211 Goldberger actually proved that this wasn't an infectious agent by generating 91 00:07:27,211 --> 00:07:30,908 his filth squad. And he and his filth squad went into 92 00:07:30,908 --> 00:07:36,397 prisons and ingested and injected the biological samples and excretions from 93 00:07:36,397 --> 00:07:39,832 individuals with pellagra, think about that. 94 00:07:39,832 --> 00:07:45,839 And yes, they probably got sick in other ways but nobody developed pellagra. 95 00:07:45,839 --> 00:07:51,595 And Goldberger even predicted as poverty continued, pellagra would too, 96 00:07:51,595 --> 00:07:56,295 and he was correct. Despite others still saying there was an 97 00:07:56,295 --> 00:08:02,887 infection, he continued to work In finding a way to prevent pellagra until 98 00:08:02,887 --> 00:08:08,469 he'd actually died. And it was in the early 1930s, after an 99 00:08:08,469 --> 00:08:15,602 animal model was discovered, that we figured out what was really going on. 100 00:08:15,602 --> 00:08:21,518 In the early 1930s, Dr. Elvehjem was able to determine what this 101 00:08:21,518 --> 00:08:24,119 compound was. He found an animal model, 102 00:08:24,119 --> 00:08:27,756 it was the dog. And a condition called the black tongue, 103 00:08:27,756 --> 00:08:30,501 kind of like the chickens back with thiamine. 104 00:08:30,501 --> 00:08:33,606 Black tongue was related to pellagra in humans. 105 00:08:33,606 --> 00:08:38,823 By curing, by curing black tongue in dogs, he was able to do research isolate 106 00:08:38,823 --> 00:08:44,371 the compound, and determined that it was Nicotinamide, or Niacin, that was the 107 00:08:44,371 --> 00:08:47,638 missing component, and the cure for Pellagra. 108 00:08:47,638 --> 00:08:53,005 The final key in this whole poverty puzzle, what people were sort of confused 109 00:08:53,005 --> 00:08:56,946 by, was why was protein alone helping prevent Pellagra. 110 00:08:56,946 --> 00:09:02,341 The key there was the discovery that the amino acid Tryptophan actually makes 111 00:09:02,341 --> 00:09:07,132 Niacin. So either eat niacin or eat tryptophan, 112 00:09:07,132 --> 00:09:12,409 and you won't get pellagra. The last vitamin I'm going to talk about, 113 00:09:12,409 --> 00:09:18,399 vitamin C's claim to fame, is scurvy. You might have actually heard some jokes 114 00:09:18,399 --> 00:09:24,492 about scurvy dogs or those limey sailors. Incidences of scurvy actually date back 115 00:09:24,492 --> 00:09:29,717 to ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome. It was a disease that was associated with 116 00:09:29,717 --> 00:09:34,492 winter and early spring when vegetables and fruits weren't available. 117 00:09:34,492 --> 00:09:39,962 And it was highly precedent, it was highly prevalent in the seagoing voyages. 118 00:09:39,962 --> 00:09:45,087 Early explorers, the Vikings, naval troops were all worried about this 119 00:09:45,087 --> 00:09:48,452 disease. I mean, you can't find a new land or go 120 00:09:48,452 --> 00:09:51,637 on a mission if everybody's dying of scurvy. 121 00:09:51,637 --> 00:09:56,972 And it was the ships that thought to bring limes and lemons aboard that were 122 00:09:56,972 --> 00:10:02,729 not coming down with scurvy. Early explorers also learned from 123 00:10:02,729 --> 00:10:08,925 American Indians that they had a cure for scurvy, was an infusion of pine and 124 00:10:08,925 --> 00:10:15,046 spruce needles and so they also helped these explorers with the condition. 125 00:10:15,046 --> 00:10:21,222 In 1747 James Lind helped us out by discovering the anti-scurvy nutrient. 126 00:10:21,222 --> 00:10:26,167 He realized that it was actually the lemons that were going aboard these 127 00:10:26,167 --> 00:10:29,164 ships. And from then on British fleets were 128 00:10:29,164 --> 00:10:33,878 charged with carrying always, lemons and lime juice on their trips. 129 00:10:33,878 --> 00:10:36,671 And that's where the limey nickname came from. 130 00:10:36,671 --> 00:10:42,109 During the 19th century Scurvy continued to spread including in children creating 131 00:10:42,109 --> 00:10:45,627 infantile scurvy. And this actually stemmed from 132 00:10:45,627 --> 00:10:49,723 individuals sterilizing milk, so killing off nutrients. 133 00:10:49,723 --> 00:10:55,204 And it wasn't until the mid 1900's that we recognized that it was a Vitamin C or 134 00:10:55,204 --> 00:10:59,742 ascorbic acid that was the missing link to preventing scurvy. 135 00:10:59,742 --> 00:11:04,257 So now it's your turn. What nutrients have I missed? Look up 136 00:11:04,257 --> 00:11:07,627 some history about the vit, other vitamins. 137 00:11:07,627 --> 00:11:13,612 How was vitamin B12 discovered? What did iron deficiency anemia have to do with 138 00:11:13,612 --> 00:11:19,722 falling in love? And why might vitamin D be for the hard headed? Find out, look it 139 00:11:19,722 --> 00:11:22,315 up and share it with me in the class.