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Vitamin E and Growth¹

Two Figures

Biochemical Laboratory, State University of Iowa, Iowa City

Rats were fed a synthetic diet, entirely free from vitamin E, containing extracted casein and yeast, sucrose, distilled ethyl esters of the fatty acids of hydrogenated cottonseed oil, carotene, calciferol and a salt mixture. The adolescent growth rate of the animals was approximately equal to that shown by animals receiving, in addition, highly purified concentrates of vitamin E in amounts adequate to produce fertility. This was also demonstrated by second generation animals which had never received vitamin E.

From the age of 2 months onward the male animals receiving vitamin E surpassed the controls in weight, and when they were sacrificed at 5 months of age they weighed approximately 10% more than the controls. There were no differences in the female animals at the age of 3 to 4 months.

The effectiveness of the vitamin E supplements was confirmed by the reproductive performance of the female animals and, in the case of the males, by the weight and histology of the testes.

Early growth in both sexes was accelerated by the inclusion of lard in vitamin E-deficient diets.

An uncomplicated vitamin E deficiency is not the cause of the early decline in growth rate and the appearance of serious malnutrition and paralysis recently observed by Blumberg and Ringsted; normal early growth is not dependent on the presence of vitamin E.

Manuscript received 18 February 1937.