Observations on the Factor Curative of Nutritional Achromotrichia

In rats kept on a basal diet deficient in vitamin B and supplemented with vitamin B1, riboflavin, and vitamin Be cutaneous lesions may appear which, in several instances, may become severe and even genera1ized.l In the same group of rats fur alterations also can be observed in the form of depigmentation (“graying”) in piebald or black animals and of “rusting” in albino animals. These fur changes, which appear to be identical with those seen by several authors2-5 in rats kept under similar nutritional conditions, were considered by Morgan et ~1.~ and Lunde and Kringstad4 to be due to lack of one of the filtrate factors. Recently Oleson et uZ.~ reported that according to their experiments the dietary factor which prevents nutritional depigmentation of the fur (achromotrichia) in rats appears “to be “distinct from all factors of the vitamin B complex which have thus far been identified and associated with specific function in the nutrition of the rat.” In our curative experiments, when concentrates of pantothenic acid with a degree of purification up to 40 to 50 per cent were added to the vitamin B-free diet containing vitamin B1, riboflavin, and vitamin Be, not only did the cutaneous lesions show distinct regression’j but t,he blackening of the fur also became definitely