The effects of vitamin‐E deficiency on the development of the chick

In an investigation of the hatchability of eggs from hens fed on a diet deficient in vitamin E Card found that all embryos from these eggs died during development. Study of these chicks showed that a variety of conditions were responsible for death: During early development the rate of growth and differentiation was definitely slower than under normal conditions, but malformations were rare. Some embryos died during the first two days, due to disintegration of the circulatory system or its failure to become established. At the end of the fourth day there was a definite critical period which few specimens survived and by this time distinet pathological conditions had arisen in extra‐embryonic structures. These involved wiping out of the vitelline circulation by establishment of a lethal ring in the blastoderm. This structure was produced by intensive cell proliferation in the mesoderm which resulted in choking out vitelline blood vessels and their subsequent degeneration. It also caused obliteration of the exocoele, with consequent failure of the allantois to expand. In addition, many embryos showed profuse haemorrage into the exocoele. The source of bleeding was most frequently in the atrium of the heart, and at the actual rupture peculiar cells occurred which were probably histiocytic mesenchyme cells. Although death was due directly to causes enumerated above, the ultimate responsibility rests upon conditions set up by them, namely: starvation, asphyxiation, and loss of the medium (blood) by which to carry on metabolic exchange.