178 CHAMBERLAIN, BLOOMBERGH, KILBOURNE. 



I. INTRODUCTION: RELATIONSHIP OF RICE TO BERIBERI AND TO 

 POLYNEURITIS GALLINARUM. 



In 1896 Eylanan(l) conducted feeding experiments with fowls and 

 found that they would develop polyneuritis when fed on polished rice ^ 

 but would not do so when given either padi (unliusked rice) or red 

 rice. These experiments were repeated and verified later by Grijins, (2) 

 Sakaki, (3) and others, and it was shown that the presence of a part of 

 the pericarp or the addition of I'ice polishings would likewise prevent 

 the disease in fowls. 



Polyneuritis of fowls was then thought, and still is believed by 

 many, to be analogous to beriberi of man, and since the fowl is easily 

 experimented with, and is one of the very few animals thus affected, it 

 became the favorite subject for feeding experiments in connection with 

 beriberi. 



However, there has always in the minds of many been a doubt whether 

 these two diseases are truly analogous, and some have felt that experi- 

 ments on man, or on an animal more closely related to man than the 

 fowl, were necessaiy in order to learn much more about the etiology 

 of beriberi. 



Vordeman, (4) in 1895-96, in the prisons of Java fed polished and nndermilled 

 rice to different groups of men and succeeded in greatly reducing the number 

 of cases of beriberi by the use of the latter variety, and he urged the substitution 

 of red (undermilled) for white (polished) rice in the public institutions of Java. 



Braddon(5) gave many additional instances of the ill effects of polished rice 



^ The endosperm of rice consists of starch except for a very thin outer portion 

 called the aleurone layer which contains the albuminous material of the seed 

 together with most of the fat. Outside of the aleurone layer is the pericarp or 

 "inner skin" which varies in color from white to nearly black and in the Philip- 

 pine rices is usually brick-red or yellowish-white. It contains most of the salts 

 in the rice. Outside the pericarp is the husk. Unhusked rice is called by the 

 English padi and in the Philippines palay. 



If a rice have red pericarp and this is completely removed by milling, the 

 resulting highly milled grain is as white as if a kernel with white pericarp 

 had been treated in the same way. "Polished rice," "highly milled rice," "scoured 

 rice," and "white rice" have been used by various writers as synonyms for rice 

 deprived of its pericarp and most of its aleurone layer. The use of the term 

 "white rice" in this sense is objectionable as liable to lead to confusion between 

 milling processes and color of pericarp. The powder produced by grinding off 

 the pericarp and the aleurone layer is called "polishings" in India, and in the 

 Philippines tiqui-tiqui. "Undermilled rice," "medium milled rice," "unpolished 

 rice," "Filipino No. 2 rice," and "red rice" are terms which have been applied to 

 rices with considerable pericarp and aleurone layer left adherent to the grain. 



As far as the presence of adherent pericarp is concerned undermilled rice 

 corresponds with the "cured rice" of India. Cured rice has been parboiled and 

 then dried before milling, the result being that the pericarp and aleurone layers 

 are less easily removed in the mills. "Cured rice" is not used in the Philippines. 



