Discovering Vitamins
Vitamins were only recently scientifically discovered. Sailors have known for centuries that something in citrus fruits (they usually used limes) could prevent scurvy (which we now know is a vitamin C deficiency) on long voyages. In the early 1900s, Sir Frederick Galen Hopkins published a paper suggesting that there were some “accessory nutrients” needed in small quantities to maintain good health. Then, in 1911, the first vitamin--thiamine--was isolated from rice polishings. Thiamine was found to be an amine (containing nitrogen). It was named “vitamine” or “amine essential for life.” The term was later converted to our current one, vitamin.