Pellagra Black tongue

Pella r, Nia.cin Deficiency. It was 220 years after the first description of pellagra that nicotinic acid was discovered to be the cure for black tongue in dogs (14), a condition suggested by a veterinarian in North Carolina to be similar to human pellagra (15). 

An excellent and succinct overview is available in Kumaravel Rajakumar, Pellagra in the United States A Historical Perspective, Southern Medical Journal 93 (2000) 272-277. The identification of niacin as the specific pellagra-preventing factor was first reported in Conrad Arnold Elvehjem, The Isolation and Identification of the Anti-Black Tongue Factor, Journal of Biological Chemistry 123 (1938) 137-149. 

Differentiation of the anti-black tongue and the P-P-factors from lactoflavin and vitamin Be (so called rat pellagra factor). Biochem. J. 29, 2830 (1935). 

It was explained above how an antipellagra factor was included in the vitamin B2 complex. However, it was demonstrated that vitamin B2 (riboflavin), isolated from the vitamin B2 complex, did not show antipellagra activity in rats. As a result, the antipellagra factor separated from the vitamin B2 complex was called vitamin Bg [5]. Consequently, the factor that cures human pellagra is clearly different from this vitamin Bg. Thus, as the cure factors for black tongue disease of the dog, which resembles human pellagra, nicotinic acid and nicotinamide were isolated. 

Its previous discovery in yeast, as well as its presence in heart muscle extracts, emphasized the metaboUc significance of nicotinamide. The emergence of nicotinic acid or nicotinamide as a nutritional essential came from the demonstration by Elvehjem et al. that black tongue in dogs could be cured and prevented by its addition to the deficient diet. Simultaneously, FoutS et alJ, Smith et al. and Spies et al. reported the successful treatment of pellagra in human subjects. Its universal occurrence in living tissue and its fundamental role in cellular respiration are now well estabhshedi . 

Prevention of scurvy multiple roles in optimizing health and resistance to infectious diseases numerous functions proposed Folate coenzymes participate in one-carbon transfer reactions in cellular metabolism Prevention of pellagra in humans and black tongue in dogs metabolic functions of nicotinamide coenzymes... 

A nutritional disorder in dogs which is similar to human pellagra, a disease due to a deficiency of the vitamin niacin. Dogs with black tongue were used in the experiments which identified niacin as the cure for this condition. 

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