History of Vitamin E

History of Vitamin E
1911  Hart and coworkers publish the first report of a suspected “anti-sterility factor” in animals.

1920  Matthill and Conklin observe reproductive anomalies in rats fed on special milk diets.

1922  Vitamin E is discovered by Evans and Scott Bishop.

1936  Evans and coworkers isolate what turns out to be α-tocopherol in its pure form from wheat germ oil.

1938  Fernholz provides the structural formula of vitamin E and Nobel laureate Karrer synthesises dl-α-tocopherol.

1945  Dam and coworkers discover peroxides in the fat tissue of animals fed on vitamin E-deficient diets. The first antioxidant theory of vitamin E activity is proposed.

1962  Tappel proposes that vitamin E acts as an in vivo antioxidant to protect cell lipids from free radicals.

1968  The Food and Nutrition Board of the US National Research Council recognises vitamin E as an essential nutrient for humans.

1974  Fahrenholtz proposes singlet oxygen quenching abilities of α-tocopherol.

1977  Human vitamin E deficiency syndromes are described.

1980  Walton and Packer propose that vitamin E may prevent the generation of potentially carcinogenic oxidative products of unsaturated fatty acids.

1980  McKay and King suggest that vitamin E functions as an antioxidant located primarily in the cell membrane.

1980s  Vitamin E is demonstrated to be the major lipid-soluble antioxidant protecting cell membranes from peroxidation. Vitamin E is shown to stabilise the superoxide and hydroxyl free radicals.

1990  Effectiveness of vitamin E in inhibiting LDL (low density lipoprotein) oxidation is shown.

1990  Kaiser and coworkers elucidate the singlet oxygen quenching capability of vitamin E.

1991  Azzi and coworkers describe an inhibitory effect of α-tocopherol on the proliferation of vascular smooth muscle cells and protein kinase C activity.

2004  Barella and coworkers demonstrate that vitamin E regulates gene expression in the liver and the testes of rats.