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Systematic research approach fostered at Guelph also further influenced medicine
JUST OVER 60 YEARS AGO, on Dec. 12, 1946, Dr. Henrik Dam (PhD) from Copenhagen gave his Nobel Prize lecture after having shared the award with Dr. Edward Doisy (PhD) of St. Louis for the discovery of vitamin K, the last of the fat-soluble vitamins to be discovered. War had delayed the presentation of the prize and his lecture by three years, but in his speech, Dr. Dam remembered to credit a group of Canadian scientists, "McFarlane and others at the Ontario Agricultural College (OAC)" with the observation that led to the discovery.
There was no record in the newspapers of the day, or indeed since then, of this compliment. The credit might have been lost forever had it not been for the Internet. The Nobel Prize Web site has made all the lectures and speeches of laureates freely available (www.nobelprize.org).
But who were these Canadians and why should their work be remembered? In 1930, Dr. William McFarlane (PhD), with students William Graham Jr. and Frederick Richardson from the OAC, submitted a report to the Journal of Biochemistry regarding a series of experiments on the fat-soluble components of chick feed. Vitamins A and D were known to be essential for growth in the chick. They felt previous researchers had failed to account for small amounts of fat and fat-soluble products in their specialized diets.
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So the trio decided to employ a classic scientific technique and used ether to remove all the fat from the basic meal and then restored various elements...