562 THE TOCOPHEROLS 



thorough study in the latter sphere^^^ reports no significant changes in 

 plasma tocopherol in cases of threatened abortion, prematurity, pre- 

 eclampsia, or essential hypertension complicating pregnancy, except for 

 patients with abortion during the 17th to 2-ith weeks of pregnancy; the 

 interpretation which may be placed upon this latter finding is questionable 

 until more data are available. Whether data on the tocopherol content of 

 aborted fetuses and placentas would contribute to a better understanding 

 of this perplexing problem remains to be determined. 



(3) Sterility in the Male. The other classic manifestation of experimental 

 vitamin E deficiency, namely, testicular degeneration in the rat, has no 

 known counterpart in man. Although Shute^*' holds the opinion that vita- 

 min E therapy causes an increase in sperm count and enhances the possi- 

 bilities that infertility in males can frequently be overcome by vitamin E 

 therapy, largely through improvement in the number and quality of the 

 sperm, Williams^^"* and Farris^^^ report that vitamin E concentrates have 

 no significant effect on sperm concentration, motility, or cytologic aberra- 

 tions in infertile men. Three other studies, yielding somewhat contradictory 

 results, are summarized by Swyer.^^^ 



VIII. Pharmacology 



KARL E. MASON 



As so aptly stated by Mattill,^ "None of the vitamins has been associated 

 with as wide a variety of biological processes as vitamin E, or has been 

 functionally related to so many basically different physiologic and chemical 

 reactions. . . . The search for some unifying principle or correlating idea 

 as to the manner of action has not been rewarding." Largely through the 

 pioneer researches of Mattill and his associates, the tocopherols have come 

 to be recognized as widely distributed and important biological antioxi- 

 dants, both in vivo and in vitro. Compared to other tocopherols (l3, y, 8), 

 a-tocopherol possesses the greatest biological activity in vivo and is re- 

 garded as the prototype of vitamin E. It represents 90% or more of the 

 tocopherols in animal tissues. Whether ingested as the natural d or the 

 synthetic dl form, or esters of the same, it is absorbed as rf-a-tocopherol; 

 the latter is probably bound to lipids or proteins during transport in the 

 blood stream and deposited as such within the cell. 



2" E. Shute, Urol, and Cutaneous Rev. 48, 423 (1944). 

 244 w. W. Williams, Trans. Am. Soc. Study Sterility 3, 67 (1947). 

 2« E. J. Farris, Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci. 52, 409 (1949). 

 ^« G. I. M. Swyer, Brit. J. Nutrition 3, 100 (1949). 

 1 H. A. Mattill, Nutrition Revs. 10, 225 (1952). 



