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Results of Feeding Rats a Thiamine-Low Diet of a Type Consumed by Human Beings

One Figure

Divisions of Experimental Medicine and Biochemistry, Mayo Foundation, Rochester, Minnesota

The purpose of this study was to observe the effects on growing white rats of feeding human diets in which the bread component was the only variable.

The addition of thiamine to the flour of diet B to an extent which doubled the thiamine intake for each gram of food consumed, did not induce any significant change of the growth curve. The addition of thiamine and riboflavin to the flour of the basal diet did increase the growth rate significantly. Such addition of thiamine and riboflavin to the basal diet induced weight increases which were statistically equal to those attained by rats eating the diet in which the bread was made of whole wheat flour.

The food intake per rat per day showed clearly the value of fortification of the flour with thiamine and riboflavin. The intake per rat per day of the diet fortified by these vitamins was equal to that of rats eating the diet of whole wheat flour.

The addition of thiamine to the flour did not increase the level of hemoglobin, but the addition of thiamine and riboflavin produced hemoglobin levels which were similar to those obtained on the whole wheat diet. These data confirm earlier observations that riboflavin increased hemoglobin production in the dog. The total erythrocyte counts, the cell volumes and reticulocyte percentages in rats eating diets A and D were statistically alike.

These data show that feeding to rats human diets, adequate with respect to proteins, carbohydrates, fats, vitamins A, C and D and essential minerals, but deficient in certain fractions of the B-complex, induced certain well-defined physical changes. These changes, such as body weight, gross appearance, and the hypochromic microcytic anemia, were improved or rectified by adding thiamine and riboflavin to the flour from which the bread component of the human diets was made.