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Humans have evolved as omnivorous hunter-gatherers over the past 250,000 years. The diet of early modern humans varied significantly depending on location and climate. The diet in the tropics tended to be based more heavily on plant foods, while the diet at higher latitudes tended more towards animal products. Analysis of postcranial and cranial remains of humans and animals from the Neolithic, along with detailed bone modification studies have shown that cannibalism was also prevalent among prehistoric humans.
Agriculture developed about 10,000 years ago in multiple locations throughout the world, providing grains such as wheat, rice, and maize, with staples such as bread and pasta. Farming also provided milk and dairy products, and sharply increased the availability of meats and the diversity of vegetables. The importance of food purity was recognized when bulk storage led to infestation and contamination risks. Cooking developed as an often ritualistic activity, due to efficiency and reliability concerns requiring adherence to strict recipes and procedures, and in response to demands for food purity and consistency.
Antiquity through Enlightenment
* The first recorded nutritional experiment is found in the Bible's Book of Daniel. Daniel and his friends were captured by the king of Babylon during an invasion of Israel. Selected as court servants, they were to share in the king's fine foods and wine. But they objected, preferring vegetables (pulses) and water in accordance with their Jewish dietary restrictions. The king's chief steward reluctantly agreed to a trial. Daniel and his friends received their diet for 10 days and were then compared to the king’s men. Appearing healthier, they were allowed to continue with their diet.
* c. 475 BC: Anaxagoras states that food is absorbed by the human body and therefore contained "homeomerics" (generative components), thereby deducing the existence of nutrients.
* c. 400 BC: Hippocrates says, "Let food be your medicine and medicine be your food."
* 1500s: Scientist and artist Leonardo da Vinci compared metabolism to a burning candle.
* 1747: Dr. James Lind, a physician in the British navy, performed the first scientific nutrition experiment, discovering that lime juice saved sailors who had been at sea for years from scurvy, a deadly and painful bleeding disorder. The discovery was ignored for forty years, after which British sailors became known as "limeys." The essential vitamin C within lime juice would not be identified by scientists until the 1930s.
* 1770: Antoine Lavoisier, the "Father of Nutrition and Chemistry" discovered the details of metabolism, demonstrating that the oxidation of food is the source of body heat.
* 1790: George Fordyce recognized calcium necessary for fowl survival.
Modern era through 1941
* Early 1800s: The elements carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen and oxygen were recognized as the primary components of food, and methods to measure their proportions were developed.
* 1816: Franc,ois Magendie discovers that dogs fed only carbohydrates and fat lost their body protein and died in a few weeks, but dogs also fed protein survived, identifying protein as an essential dietary component.
* 1840: Justus Liebig discovers the chemical makeup of carbohydrates (sugars), fats (fatty acids) and proteins (amino acids.)
* 1860s: Claus Bernard discovers that body fat can be synthesised from carbohydrate and protein, showing that the energy in blood glucose can be stored as fat or as glycogen.
* Early 1880s: Kanehiro Takaki observed that Japanese sailors developed beriberi (or endemic neuritis, a disease causing heart problems and paralysis) but British sailors did not. Adding milk and meat to Japanese diets prevented the disease.
* 1896: Baumann observed iodine in thyroid glands.
* 1897: Christiaan Eijkman worked with natives of Java, who also suffered from beriberi. Eijkman observed that chickens fed the native diet of white rice developed the symptoms of beriberi, but remained healthy when fed unprocessed brown rice with the outer bran intact. Eijkman cured the natives by feeding them brown rice, discovering that food can cure disease. Over two decades later, nutritionists learned that the outer rice bran contains vitamin B1, also known as thiamine.
* Early 1900s: Carl Von Voit and Max Rubner independently measure caloric energy expenditure in different species of animals, applying principles of physics in nutrition.
* 1906: Wilcock and Hopkins showed that the amino acid tryptophan was necessary for the survival of mice. Gowland Hopkins recognized "accessory food factors" other than calories, protein and minerals, as organic materials essential to health but which the body cannot synthesise.
* 1907: Stephen M. Babcock and Edwin B. Hart conduct the Single-grain experiment. This experiment runs through 1911.
* 1912: Casimir Funk coined the term vitamin, a vital factor in the diet, from the words "vital" and "amine," because these unknown substances preventing scurvy, beriberi, and pellagra, were thought then to be derived from ammonia.
* 1913: Elmer McCollum discovered the first vitamins, fat soluble vitamin A, and water soluble vitamin B (in 1915; now known to be a complex of several water-soluble vitamins) and names vitamin C as the then-unknown substance preventing scurvy. Lafayette Mendel and Thomas Osborne also perform pioneering work on vitamin A and B.
* 1919: Sir Edward Mellanby incorrectly identified rickets as a vitamin A deficiency, because he could cure it in dogs with cod liver oil.
* 1922: McCollum destroys the vitamin A in cod liver oil but finds it still cures rickets, naming vitamin D
* 1922: H.M. Evans and L.S. Bishop discover vitamin E as essential for rat pregnancy, originally calling it "food factor X" until 1925.
* 1925: Hart discovers trace amounts of copper are necessary for iron absorption.
* 1927: Adolf Otto Reinhold Windaus synthesizes vitamin D, for which he won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1928.
* 1928: Albert Szent-Gyorgyi isolates ascorbic acid, and in 1932 proves that it is vitamin C by preventing scurvy. In 1935 he synthesizes it, and in 1937 he wins a Nobel Prize for his efforts. Szent-Gyorgyi concurrently elucidates much of the citric acid cycle.
* 1930s: William Cumming Rose identifies essential amino acids, necessary protein components which the body cannot synthesize.
* 1935: Underwood and Marston independently discover the necessity of cobalt.
* 1936: Eugene Floyd Dubois shows that work and school performance are related to caloric intake.
* 1938: The chemical structure of vitamin E is discovered by Erhard Fernholz, and it is synthesised by Paul Karrer.
* 1940 UK institutes rationing according to nutritional principles drawn up by Elsie Widdowson and others
* 1941: The first Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDAs) were established by the National Research Council.
Recent
* 1992 The U.S. Department of Agriculture Introduces Food Guide Pyramid
* 2002 Study shows relation between nutrition and violent behavior
* 2005 Obesity may be caused by adenovirus in addition to bad nutrition
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Important notice:
The content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other
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