Inadequacy for Mice of a Synthetic Diet Supplemented with All Known Vitamin B Factors. ∗

Abstract

Summary

When fed a basal diet containing extracted casein. sucrose, salts, cod liver oil, corn oil, and butter fat, together with supplements consisting of thiamin chloride, riboflavin, pyridoxin hydrochloride, nicotinic acid, calcium pantothenate, choline hydrochloride, ascorbic acid, inositol and p-aminobenzoic acid, young mice grew at a good rate but after some weeks did not present consistently clean and good looking fur. Increasing the casein and salts or doubling the daily quota of the supplements, or both, failed to improve the appearance or growth of the mice. Feeding fresh beef liver increased the growth rate and improved the pelage. A concentrate of a liver extract had similar but not as pronounced effects. Pimelic acid had no significant effect on growth and certainly no beneficial effect on the pelage, for the time range of these experiments.