THE CHLORQPLAST PIGMENTS 



All 



organs develop the flesh becomes paler and 

 the rapidly growing ovaries acquire a 

 fine orange red color. Palmer suggests 

 that the explanation of this phenomenon 

 lies in the mobilization of the fat stores of 

 the body in the reproductive organs and 

 the shed ova rather than in the mobiliza- 

 tion of the pigment itself. 



Thus, there are three views regarding 

 the carotinoid-lipoid relation, the most 

 logical of which is that the pigment is 

 mobilized along with the food which is 

 stored in the egg, and this idea would 



I support the theory that carotinoids and 

 vitamines are not related in any way. 



i The fact that the yellow pigments are 

 deflected from the normal path of excretion 

 and are found in the milk and in egg 



j yolks does not necessarily mean that they 

 are useful. 



Javillier, Baude and Lajeunesse have 

 looked in another direction for a solution 

 of the vitamine question than have most 



! workers. They experimented to ascertain 



| if factor A had any relation to phytol, a 

 derivative of chlorophyll. From their 

 experiments they concluded that phytol 

 is not vitamine A. 



In this part of the paper the writer has 

 attempted to assemble some of the evi- 



! dence showing that the vitamines are not 



i carotin or xanthophyll and that they are 

 not phytol, a chlorophyll derivative. As 

 far as the plant pigments are concerned 

 there seems to be only one other possi- 

 bility. That possibility will now be 

 considered by reviewing what various 

 authors have to say on the subject. 



PROBABLE RELATION OF CHLOROPHYLL TO 



THE VITAMINES. CHEMICAL ELEMENTS 



PRESENT IN VITAMINES 



Before we take up that possible relation 

 it would not be out of place to mention 

 here that some have sought to associate 

 the role of vitamines with the general 



body metabolism. Funk, Bradden and 

 Cooper sought to establish a relation 

 between vitamine B and carbohydrate 

 metabolism. Drummond investigated 

 the effect of vitamine B on nitrogen 

 metabolism and the effect of vitamine A on 

 fat metabolism. 



At this point a definition of vitamines 

 might assist us somewhat in our search for 

 them. Randoin and Simonnet say that 

 vitamines are substances not yet chemi- 

 cally or physically identified, which the 

 animal organism is incapable of synthe- 

 sizing, which are obtained in certain 

 fractions of the undetermined portions of 

 the food and which in exceedingly small 

 amounts are indispensable to the vital 

 phenomena during the course of develop- 

 ment of the animal or in its adult condi- 

 tion and whose absence is responsible for 

 characteristic disturbances of nutrition. 



No vitamine has yet been isolated. If 

 it is not the lability of the compound in 

 question, it is its extreme chemical 

 indifference to such reagents as are 

 ordinarily used to modify solubilities 

 that prevents its separation from its 

 environment. The present state of our 

 knowledge is such that any indication as 

 to the probable nature of a vitamine is 

 worthy of investigation. The chemical 

 and physical properties of any one of the 

 vitamines are not very well known. 

 Autoclaving at 15 pounds pressure for 

 three hours did not destroy any of vita- 

 mine A as found in yellow corn, nor did 

 this treatment cause any noticeable 

 destruction of the vitamine in chard, 

 carrots, sweet potatoes and squash. 

 Experiments have demonstrated that vita- 

 mine A as found in the plant kingdom in 

 grains, leaf and stem tissue, in fleshy roots 

 and in vegetables is comparatively stable 

 at a high temperature. 



Vitamine A is destroyed by long 

 exposure to light and air. When melted 



