Plants and Vitamins

Abstract

FEW studies in biochemistry have aroused such popular interest as the remarkable advances made in recent years concerning the dependence of animals on small doses of those substances, produced mainly by plants, which we call the vitamins. It is natural that the marked heterotrophy for these substances in man has stimulated interest largely in the vitamin aspects of animal nutrition ; but it has always seemed anomalous that the importance of vitamins to the plant which makes them, realized only vaguely even by many botanists, has not had wider publication. This gap has now been filled in this remarkable book, and it is well that the first major review should come from the hands of an expert, and indeed one who may be said to be the founder of the modern science of plant vitaminology. His book is, as it must be, of the nature of a preliminary report on a subject now in the full tide of development ; but it tells, in an orderly way, of all the important advances made in the ten years since Schopfer (1934) first showed the necessity for vitamins in the culture of Phycomyces, with sufficient bibliography to enable enthusiasts to find other sources of information. It is further very satisfactory that the author, though not hesitating to reproduce and discuss the structural formulae of the vitamins and to emphasize the vitally important, if purely chemical, aspects of vitamin structure, does not fall into the trap of making the work biochemical. It is a book written by a plant physiologist for plant physiologists.

Plants and Vitamins

By W. H. Schopfer. (A New Series of Plant Science Books, Vol. 11.) Pp. xiv + 300. (Waltham, Mass.: Chronica Botanica Company; London: Wm. Dawson and Sons, Ltd., 1943.) 4.75 dollars.