Elmer Verner Maccollum
(Redfield, 1879-Baltimore, 1967) American biochemist and biologist who made fundamental contributions in the field of dietetics, especially on the types of vitamins.He began studying at the University of Kansas, where he graduated in 1903.Later, he entered Yale University, where he received his doctorate in 1906.Between 1907 and 1927 he was Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin (1907-27) and in the period 1917-1944 at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, an institution that, upon retirement, appointed him Honorary Professor.
In his first investigations he tried to find a diet based on the mixture of simple substances, but he was unsuccessful in his experiments with animals despite enriching the flavor of the food in case this was what failed.He continued the work of the Nobel laureates Christiaan Eijkman-discoverer of the first vitamin, thiamine or B1-and Frederick Hopkins, as well as Casimir Funk, on the different types of substances present in natural food and which are the fundamental factors of nutrition.
In 1913 he investigated the composition of some fats in the belief that they contained vitamin substances; thus, simultaneously with Marguerite Davis and Lafayette Mendel, he discovered a fat-soluble vitamin in the yolk of the egg, which he called "A", and another soluble in water, which he called "B".In 1922 he discovered soluble vitamin D in cod liver oil.
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