Evening star., 1941-04-12
Of Stors, Men
And Atoms
Notebook of Science Progress
In Laboratory, Field
And Study
BIZ Thomas r. Henry.

A newly discovered eye disease due
| to lack of a vitamin has just been re-
| ported to the Southern Medical Asso-
! citation by two University of Georgia
| doctors.
1t is characterized by complex OF
| symptoms-burning and itching of the
eyes, fear of sunlight, abnormal secre-
| ton of tears, rapid firing Of the eyes,
poor distance vision and inability to see
| at dawn or twilight.
When an oculist examines the eyes
| Of such a patient specifically they are
likely to be found normal. When glasses
are prescribed they do no good. If heavy
doses of ribofavin, the greenish yellow
vitamin best known in skim milk, and
which it now is proposed to put in
bread, are given, the more startling
symptoms clear up in few days. A year
may be required for all the pathological
| symptoms to disappear.
| Ninety per cent of 100 patients treated
in this way showed marked improve
ment, it is reported by Drs. V. P. Syden-
stricker, A. r. Kelly and j. w. Weaver
When the cornea of the eye is exam
| ined with an optical instrument known
as the slit lamp, they report, there is
found a great increase in the capillaries,
| or tiny blood vessels which sometimes
| are laced into mat. Also, especially
with gray or blue-eyed persons, hazel
spots are likely to appear in the iris.
| ,I,ic I, y |,
lieve, may be one of the earliest signs
| of the newly discovered disease, aribo-
| flavinosis. Until year ago physicians
felt that ribofavin, minute amounts of
which are present in every cell in the
body, must have some vital role 1t
was known to be combined with phos-
phorus in the body, stored up in the
liver, and probably essential for the
breathing" of all individual cells. No
specific disease condition, however, had
been traced to lack of it.
Then DR.. w. H. Sebrell of the United
States Public Health Service found that
a deficiency of it in the diet was re-
sponsible for curious condition with
cracks in the side of the mouth and a
cracked, magenta-colored tongue. which
was quite common through parts of the
South, but which was confused with pei
lagra.
When pellagra victims were cured with
doses Of another vitamin, nicotine acid,
this condition remained and sometimes
became accentuated 1t was cured quick
! ly with ribof1avin and was called aribo-
| havlnoSls. 1t now appears, DR.. Syden-
stricker reports to the Southern Medi-
cal Association, that NICOTINE acid might
even make the condition worse because
it calls into action certain mechanisms
OF the body which require more than
normal amounts of the other vitamin.
The eye condition also appeared among
cured victims of pellagra. In some cases
1t was associated with symptoms of
arlbof1avinosis and in others appeared
alone. 1t may be very widespread and
unrecognized throughout the country
since, Dr. Sydenstricker says, the eye
probably is the organ first affected. The
malady is quite different they point out
from the inability to see in dim light
which is caused by a deficiency of vita
min A.
Some degree of ribo1avin deficiency
is quite probable, they say, since it is
less abundant in foods than other ele-
ments of the B complex of vitamins, and
1t is inactivated either by an alkaline
stomach or by exposure to light
They found that heavy doses-as high
as 2000th of an ounce daily-were
sometimes necessary to get a cure un-
derWay. The fear of light inability to
see at distance, and blindness in dim
light could be cured dramatically in 70
hours. Two or three weeks we're re-
qulred before the more obvious changes
IN the cornea disappeared and some
signs may remain for from 10 months to
year. Once a patient is on the way
toward q cure, the Georgia doctors
found, from three to five milligrams a
day of the vitamif is sufficient to pre-
vent relapse.
Uncle Sans nose is wrong
The old gentleman traditionally Is
pictured with a decided convex nose.
whereas it should be rather straight. or
only moderately convex. says DR.. Ales
Hrdlicka, curator of physical anthro-
pology of the Smithsonian Institution.
Uncle Sam, as a symbolic figure repre-
senting the composite American man
with few generations of American and
probably Anglo-Saxon ancestry, should
comply with this composite, Dr. Hrdlicka
says.
In most respects, he points out, the
symbolic figure is all right, but he has
seldom encountered an Uncle Sam nose. ~
Among old Americans at large, % per
cent have straight noses and AZ per cent
have slightly, or moderately convex ones.
The form of the nose" says DR..
Hrdlicka lis Interestingly variable in
man, and in the white races in particu-
lar. This is due in the main to the
different developments of the bony and
cartilaginous parts of the nose, but also
to some extent of the soft parts of the
organ.
THE shape of the nose changes more
| or less, particularly in males from