E. E. Howe

Amino acid supplementation of cereal grains as related to the world food supply.

I T is eStifllate(l at the present time that more than 50 per cent of the population of the world is undernourished.’ It is often stated that the most acute single deficiency is that of high quality protein. That this may be so is supported by the widespread occurrence of kwashiorkor, a protein deficiency disease prevalent in children of many of the technically underdeveloped countries. A detailed analysis of world problenis in protein nutrition has been published.’ The widespread use of animal protein to correct this deficiency is unlikely since production of such protein is necessarily alow efficiency process. Much thinking and effort has been expended in the direction of correcting the situation by use of vegetable products of high protein content, namely, the legumes and oil seed cakes. However, it is unlikely that legumes can be grown in sufficient quantity

Interrelation of Cholesterol, Palmitic Acid, and Unsaturated Fatty Acids in the Growing Mouse and Rat

During the course of a study of the nu tritional effects of various fats and fatty acids it was observed that the feeding to weanling mice of a purified type of diet containing 10% of a hydrogenated coco nut oil,8 20% of palmitic acid, and 1% of cholesterol caused a complete cessation of growth with all animals dying within a period of 5 days. No abnormalities were noted in the mice except for extremely small spleens and lymph nodes and these showed no histological defects. The liter ature on atherosclerosis, lipid metabolism and related topics is very ex tensive and mentions many interesting interrelationships of factors such as satu rated and unsaturated fatty acids, choles terol, pyridoxine and still other substances. None of these interrelationships, to the best of our knowledge, is associated with the phenomenon we observed. This paper is a report of the observations made in the course of experiments designed to throw some light on this peculiar phenomen.

The effect of cholanic acid on sterol and fatty acid synthesis

Abstract The effects of cholanic acid on incorporation of glucose-U-14C into digitonin-precipitable sterol (DPS) and fatty acid in liver and extrahepatic tissues of mice and rats have been investigated. Cholanic acid lowers plasma triglycerides in both species, but lowers cholesterol only in mice. Incorporation of glucose-U-14C into liver fatty acid was lowered by cholanic acid in both mice and rats, as was the percentage by weight of this fraction. Incorporation into liver DPS in both species was reduced after 1-day treatment with cholanic acid, but was considerably elevated when the cholanic acid was fed for a 7-day period. Cholanic acid caused the percentage by weight of DPS in the liver to decrease in mice but to increase in rats. Incorporation of glucose-U-14C into extrahepatic fatty acid or DPS was not influenced in rats or mice by feeding cholanic acid in the diet for up to 7 days. When fed in the diet to mice for 6 weeks cholanic acid caused the percentage of body fat as well as the weight of the epididymal fat pads to be reduced approximately 35%. Under these conditions incorporation of glucose-U-14C into fatty acid in epididymal fat was stimulated 3-fold.

The hypolipemic properties of 5β-cholanic acid in the mouse and rat

Abstract Dietary 5β-cholanic acid in the mouse caused a marked reduction of plasma cholesterol, an increase in rate of excretion of intraperitoneally administered 14 C-labeled cholic and chenodeoxycholic acids and an increase in rate of excretion of orally administered 14 C-labeled cholesterol. In this species it also caused a reduction in plasma triglycerides and an increase in liver size. Dietary 5β-cholanic acid did not greatly influence the rate of synthesis of cholesterol by liver homogenates of normally fed mice, but did cause a striking increase in this parameter in mice in which liver cholesterol synthesis had been suppressed by feeding cholesterol. In the rat 5β-cholanic acid caused a striking reduction in plasma triglycerides, but in sharp contrast to the effect observed in the mouse, a mild elevation of plasma cholesterol. In in vitro and in vivo experiments, in the presence and absence of depressed cholesterol synthesis by dietary cholesterol, 5β-cholanic acid caused a marked increase in rate of cholesterol synthesis by rat liver homogenates. Finally, in the rat, 5β-cholanic acid caused a sharp increase in plasma post heparin lipoprotein lipase activity.