Year: 2008
Type: article
Abstract: Pellagra was first identified among Spanish peas-ants by Don Gaspar Casal in 1735. A loathsome skin disease, it was called ‘mal de la rosa ’ and often mistaken for leprosy. Pellagra has sometimes been called the disease of the four Ds – dermatitis, diar-rhoea, dementia and death. In 1937 it was dis-covered that pellagrawas caused by a deficiency of the B vitamin niacin (nicotinic acid). The body’s synthesis of this vitamin depends on the avail-ability of the essential amino acid tryptophan, which is found inmilk, cheese, fish,meat and eggs. Two decades before the discovery of niacin, how-ever, epidemiological and clinical research done by Joseph Goldberger and his colleagues had identified that pellagra could be prevented by im-
Author: Alfredo Morabia
Institution: Queens College, CUNY
Language: English
Subfield: History and Philosophy of Science
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2015311102