Drugs Affecting the Peripheral Nervous System

The primary object of this study group was to decide whether there could be more than one biochemical lesion in thiamine (vitamin B1) deficiency.Over thirty years ago Sir Rudolph Peters, in honour of whom this conference was organized, showed that the biochemical lesion in the acute opisthotonos of the pigeon deprived of thiamine was in the pyruvate oxidase system.It was subsequently found that in acute beriberi, but not in the subacute or chronic forms, the level of pyruvate in the blood was markedly elevated.But pyruvate tolerance tests on