594 voegtlin: role of vitamines in nutrition 



other hand, is only slightly affected by this treatment. 5 Salting 

 and smoking food is also commonly resorted to. Little is known 

 as to the effect of these last mentioned methods of preservation 

 on the vitamine content. Another method of food preservation 

 which has assumed immense proportions within the last 50 years 

 is the canning of food. The process of canning was discovered 

 in the time of Napoleon the first, who offered a prize to the 

 scientists of his country for a method of preserving fresh foods. 

 Appert received the prize, as he was able to show that food 

 exposed for some time to the temperature of boiling water and 

 kept from contact with the air could be stored for a considerable 

 time without danger of decay. This process was used to a 

 limited extent in the period immediately following its discovery, 

 but the credit belongs to this country for having put it on a 

 large scale, until nowadays nearly everybody consumes part of 

 his diet in the form of canned foods. It seems important, there- 

 fore, to determine whether or not canning of food deprives the 

 food of some of its vitamine content. Experiments having this 

 idea in view have been made by myself and others on a small 

 scale, but it is altogether too early to draw any definite con- 

 clusions. Thus, several statements can be found in the litera- 

 ture pointing to the destructive action of the canning on the 

 antineuritic vitamine present in fresh meat and fresh milk. On 

 the other hand, I have been able to show that canned peas and 

 beans seem to retain a considerable amount of antineuritic 

 vitamine. Such questions should be given considerable atten- 

 tion, keeping in mind, however, that the benefits derived from 

 the fact that canned foods are available for human nutrition are 

 very considerable. This statement applies equally well to the 

 milling of cereals. While it is of prime importance to preserve 

 the full nutritive value of foods, at the same time it is imperative 

 that we also consider the great benefit which our modern methods 

 of food production and food preservation have yielded. Any 

 deficiencies in these methods from the point of view of the 



6 Hoist and Froelich in 1907 succeeded in producing scurvy in guinea pigs by 

 means of an exclusive diet of dry cereals. 



