Ancel Keys facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Ancel Keys
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Keys in 1945
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Ancel Benjamin Keys
January 26, 1904 |
| Died | November 20, 2004 (aged 100) |
| Nationality | American |
| Citizenship | United States |
| Alma mater | University of California at Berkeley, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Kings College, Cambridge |
| Known for | Human Nutrition, K-ration, Mediterranean diet |
| Spouse(s) | Margaret Keys |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Human Nutrition, Public Health, epidemiology |
| Institutions | University of Minnesota |
| Academic advisors | August Krogh |
Ancel Benjamin Keys (January 26, 1904 – November 20, 2004) was an American physiologist who studied the influence of diet on health. In particular, he hypothesized that dietary saturated fat causes cardiovascular heart disease and should be avoided. Modern dietary recommendations by health organizations, systematic reviews, and national health agencies agree with this.
Keys studied starvation in men and published The Biology of Human Starvation (1950), which remains the only source of its kind.
He examined the epidemiology of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and was responsible for two famous diets: K-rations, formulated as balanced meals for combat soldiers in World War II, and the Mediterranean diet, which he popularized with his wife Margaret. Science, diet, and health were central themes in his professional and private lives.
Early life
Ancel Keys was born in Colorado Springs. In 1906 the family moved to San Francisco before the 1906 San Francisco earthquake struck. Shortly after the disaster, his family relocated to Berkeley where he grew up.
Keys was intelligent as a boy; Lewis Terman, a noted psychologist and inventor of the Stanford-Binet IQ Test, described him as intellectually "gifted".
During his youth, he left high school to pursue odd jobs, such as shoveling bat guano in Arizona, a powder monkey in a Colorado mine, and in a lumber camp. He eventually finished his secondary education and was admitted to the University of California at Berkeley in 1922.
Later years and death
When Keys was hired at the Mayo Foundation in 1936, he hired Margaret Haney (1909–2006) as a medical technologist. In 1939 they married and had three children. Together, Margaret and Keys co-authored three books, two of them bestsellers. They traveled the world, going to places like Japan and South Africa to record data for Ancel's published works such as the Seven Countries Study.
Keys received three notable awards: Commander, Order of the Lion of Finland (1963), the McCollum Award from the American Society of Clinical Nutrition (1967), and an honorary doctor of science from the University of Minnesota (2001).
Keys died on November 20, 2004, two months before his 101st birthday. A year earlier, he had left Pioppi, his beloved village in the Cilento region located on the southwest coast of Italy, where he had spent 28 years of his life.
Development of K-rations
In 1937, Keys began teaching physiology at the University of Minnesota, where he founded the Laboratory of Physiological Hygiene. His earlier research on human physiology led to an assignment with the Army Quartermaster Corps, where they worked to develop a more portable and nonperishable ration that would provide enough calories to sustain soldiers (such as paratroopers) in the field for up to two weeks.
The initial ingredients of the K-ration were procured at a local Minneapolis grocery store—hard biscuits, dry sausage, hard candy, and chocolate. The final product was different from Keys' original ingredients, but most of Keys' suggestions made it to the final product. The rations weighed only 28 oz (790 g), but provided 3200 calories per day. Though several sources claim the name was unrelated to Keys, many historical references support the claim that the K-ration was indeed named after him. The K-ration became such a success that it was often used for more than temporary sustenance, becoming a major staple of military nutrition.
See also
In Spanish: Ancel Keys para niños
