Williams R J, Heffley J D, Bode C W
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1971 Oct;68(10):2361-4. doi: 10.1073/pnas.68.10.2361.
This is an extension of an earlier study in which we found that while commercial "enriched" bread alone would not support the life of weanling rats in a 90-day test, enrichment could be updated at low cost, with the result that rats consuming the improved bread alone lived during the test period and grew seven times as fast. Prominent nutritionists criticized this study on the basis that bread is not eaten alone and that other single foods are likewise deficient. It was stated: "the experiments you performed would have given the same or similar results if you had begun with milk, eggs, meat, or any other food". Skepticism regarding this statement led to experimental trials in which milk, meat, eggs, and several other foods, including breakfast cereals, were fed singly to groups of animals. Eggs proved to be a remarkably complete food, and milk exhibited about the same excellence until the iron deficiency became evident after about two months. "Enriched" breakfast foods and macaroni were highly deficient and could be improved greatly by supplementation.As an outgrowth of this study, we are developing a method of biological testing which is incomparably better for evaluating foods than consulting food composition tables. On the basis of the tabulated data alone one might conclude that "enriched" puffed rice, for example, is only slightly inferior nutritionally to eggs. Our experiments have shown this assumption to be grossly in error.
这是早期一项研究的延续。在早期研究中我们发现，在为期90天的试验里，仅食用市售“强化”面包无法维持断奶幼鼠的生命，但强化成本可以降低，结果是仅食用改良面包的大鼠在试验期内存活下来，生长速度加快了7倍。著名营养学家批评这项研究，理由是面包并非单独食用，其他单一食物同样存在营养缺陷。有人指出：“如果你从牛奶、鸡蛋、肉类或任何其他食物开始试验，你所进行的实验会得出相同或类似的结果”。对这一说法的怀疑导致了试验，将牛奶、肉类、鸡蛋以及包括早餐谷物在内的其他几种食物分别喂给几组动物。结果证明鸡蛋是一种非常完美的食物，牛奶在大约两个月后出现明显缺铁现象之前，表现出大致相同的优良程度。“强化”早餐食品和通心粉营养严重不足，通过补充营养可以大大改善。作为这项研究的成果，我们正在开发一种生物测试方法，这种方法在评估食物方面比查阅食物成分表要好得多。仅根据列表数据，人们可能会得出结论，例如“强化”爆米花在营养方面仅略逊于鸡蛋。我们的实验表明这一假设大错特错。
