1949 - Nutrition

Nutrition

South Carolina-born University of Illinois nutritionist William Cumming Rose, 62, shows that eight amino acids are "essential" to human health, a smaller number than is needed by rats. By feeding students and rats diets completely lacking in protein but containing pure amino acids he demonstrates that the body can create the additional amino acids it needs if supplied with isoleucine, leucine, lysine, methionine, phenylalinine, threonine, tryptophan, and valine. Threonine has not been considered an essential amino acid but Rose demonstrates its importance. Since rice is deficient in tryptophan, rice eaters will suffer protein deficiencies unless their diets include a source of threonine (abundant in beans).