333 ] 



No. 42. 



EXPERIMENTS ON THE POSSIBLE EFFECT OP VITAMINS ON 

 QUANTITY OF MILK AND BUTTER FAT. 



By E. J. SHEEHY, F.R.C.Sc.L, B.Sc, M.R.I.A. 

 [Bio-Chemical Laboratory, D. A.T.I. ] 



(Read FEBRU.UiY 26. Piiuted April 24, 192-1.) 



That vitamins, or accessoiy food factors, are necessary for growth and continued- 

 metabolic activity of the body, is no longer a matter of controversy. At least 

 three different accessoiy factors, now known as A, B, and C, function for 

 different purposes : A supports growth and strengthens resistance to disease, 

 B also supports growth and helps to maintain nei'vous efiiciency, and C prevents 

 skin diseases, vascular, and other disorders. The vegetable kingdom is the 

 ultimate source of the vitamins, which cannot be synthesised de novo by 

 animals, but the suckling mother can, to a certain extent, utilise the resei"ves 

 of her own body to supply the vitamins in her mUk,^ even where her diet 

 is deficient in these materials. When these reserves are exhausted, however, 

 the vitamin content of milk is proportional to that of the food from which the 

 milk is derived.^ 



"While a definite relationship between the vitamin content of the food of 

 a lactating animal and its milk is established, there is no information as to 

 the part played by these factors in the processes of milk production. There 

 is evidence to show that the activity of the mammary gland cells is dependent ' 

 on internal secretions from other parts of the body. Developments in the 

 ovary and in. the uteras are succeeded by evolution of the mammary cells, ^" 

 and there is an immediate response in milk production after the injection of 

 a small dose of pituitrin into the blood of a lactating animal.'* Probably there 

 are other internal secretions, as well as some chemical substances of food, 

 which act as hormones for the mammary cells, and the possible effect of some 

 or all of the accessory food factors suggested itself. 



To investigate this problem thi'ee goats were selected and fed with a view 

 to exhausting the stores of vitamins A, B, and C in animals I, II, and III, 

 respectively, for some time previous to paiturition and subsequent to it. This 

 was done by feeding each goat on a ration complete in all respects except the 

 vitamin wliose effect on the milk yield wasi afterwards to be investigated. 

 When the animals had milked for several weeks, each was given, without 

 otherwise changing the diet, the particular factor in which the previous food 

 had been lacking, and the effect of the addition noted. The determinations 

 made were total milk, butter fat in milk, and the weight of the animal. The 



* The Newer Knowledge of Nutrition. M' GoUum, 1919. Chapter vi. 



»Jr. Biol. Chem., xxvii, 33. Ibid., xlv, 119. Ibid., 1, 339. Biochem. Jr., sv, 540. 

 Tr A-Oric. Sc xiii 144. 

 ' = Physiology of 'Reproductiou. Marshall, 1910, page 580. Proc. Roy. See, IxxxviiB, 422. 



«Proc. Roy. Soc, IxxxivB, 16. Jour. Dairy Sc, i, 475. Ibid., iv, 474. Quarterly Jr. 

 Physiol., vi, p. 315. 



SCIKNT. PROC. K.D.S., VOL. XVII. NQ. 42. 3 S 



