Image: J. C. Drummond, The Nomenclature of the So-called Accessory Food Factors (Vitamins), 1920

Description: The single-paragraph article which provided the structure and name of the compounds known today as vitamins J. C. Drummond, “The Nomenclature of the So-called Accessory Food Factors (Vitamins)”, Biochemical Journal (1920), 14:660

In 1912 Hopkins published his classical paper in which he described the important influence of certain dietary constituents on the processes of growth and nutrition. These substances he termed the "accessory factors of the diet." At about the same time Funk, who was working on the subject of experimental beriberi, coined the name "Vitamine" for the same class of substances. Since then the literature has been a good deal confused by the great variety of names which have been utilised to denote these or similar dietary constituents (auximones, Bottomley; nutramines, Abderhalden, etc.). The criticism usually raised against Funk's word Vitamine is that the termination "-ine" is one strictly employed in chemical nomenclature to denote substances of a basic character, whereas there is no evidence which supports his original idea that these indispensable dietary constituents are amines. The word has, however, been widely adopted, and therefore until we know more about the actual nature of the substances themselves, it would be difficult and perhaps unwise to eliminate it altogether. The suggestion is now advanced that the final "-e" be dropped, so that the resulting word Vitamin is acceptable under the standard scheme of nomenclature adopted by the Chemical Society, which permits a neutral substance of undefined composition to bear a name ending in "-in." If this suggestion is adopted, it is recommended that the somewhat cumbrous nomenclature introduced by McCollum (Fat-soluble A, Water-soluble B), be dropped, and that the substances be spoken of as Vitamin A, B, C, etc. This simplified scheme should be quite sufficient untilsuch time as the factors are isolated, and their true nature identified.
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