Carlton Fredericks, M.A.

NUTRITION RESEARCH CONSULTANT

MEMBER:

“ SERICAN ACADEMY OF APPLIED NUTRITION NUTRITION COMMENTATOR

WMGM., NEW YORK 22,N. Y.
NW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES

AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE April 28, 1950

ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE

AMERICAN ACADEMY OF DENTAL MEDICINE

Mr. J. Lederberg

Dept. of Genetics
University of Wisconsin
Madison 6, Wisc.

Dear Mr. Lederberg:

The evidence for the influence of the father's preconception diet on the health of
the child is rather diffuse, which is why I used the language which I did in the
pamphiet you read,

First, there is a vast body of evidence to show that, in accordance with Murphy's
dictum, the factors which influence the germ plasm do not spring into action after
conception takes place, but operate at all times. With these literatures I an
sure you are acquainted.

Second, in Weston Price's "Nutrition and Physical Degeneration", published by the
American Academy of Applied Nutrition, Monrovia, California, you will find details
of an experiment in which a deficient diet, fed to a male dog, which was
subsequently mated with four normal females on adequate nutrition, resulted in
litters of puppies marked by “congenital defects” of the order of cleft palate,
here lip, spinal deformities, and club feet. The defective male puppies, on good
nutrition, mated with the same females, sired normal young.

Third, there is (unpublished) experimental research in which we have demonstrated
that allergies in the young animal can be induced by manipulation of the paternal
pre~conception diet for three generations, This work was performed with cats.

Fourth, we must not ignore the body of evidence which can be accumulated by obser-
vation of primitive practice. To some of these practices, you will find reference
in the Price text previously cited, where, it is observed, special diets for both
fexees are demanded prior to conception of a child.

In the Australian medical literetures you will find references to impaired fertility
in the male, observed in the Australian soldiers engaged in the Port Moresby
campaign, as & result, apparently, of Vitamin E deficiency in the rations, inducing
degeneration of the testicular tissue which is indistinguishable from that produced
in the male rate by a similar degree of deficiency.

Here is the point at which the evidence becomes somewhat diffuse. Does the work of
Warkany, discarding the “all or nothing" principle in the effect of nutrition on
reproductive efficiency, extend to the male? Is there then a threghhold at which
fertility remains unimpaired, but reproductive efficiency is lowered? The
literatures are suggestive of the tenability of euch a tentative conclusion.

Last, my medical colleagues and I have observed repeated instances where a normal
mother, properly fed, has born a defective child - physically or mentally aberrant -
Mr. J. Lederberg -2- April 27, 1950

after her husband had been subjected to a prolonged period of malnutrition, for one
reason or another. In some of these cases we have observed a sequence: an abnormal
child after paternal malnutrition; a normal child following, when the father wae well
fed; and then, after another period of paternal malnutrition, another defective child.

From these combined observations, were it not for scientific caution,I should be
inclined to use stronger language than the enclosed pamphlet has implied. I so
indicated in a recent address before the Society for the Study of Sterility, here in
New York, and found to my surprise, that many of the geneticists and many of the
obstetricians are ignorant of the small body of evidence which I have here partially
outlined.

i think you will recall also that there have been sports produced by x-ray irradiation
of fruit flies, which breed as true mutations for a number of generatione, when
normalcy is restored by a change in the nutrition of the flies,

There is, accordingly, some evidence in research with the nutrition of the female, to
indicate that heredity is not immutable, nor the germ plasm uninfluenced by the
internal environment of the host. It seems to me that there is no logical reason for
denying that a similar poseibility exists with the male.

Sincerely yours ,

  

CARLTON FREDERICKS
CF /bm