Quantity and Source of Proteins as Factors in the Resistance of Chickens to Ascarids ,

DIETARY deficiencies and disease have been associated through the years. However, experimental tests of a single food deficiency on the host resistance to a parasite appear to have begun in 1926 when Zimmerman, Vincent and Ackert found that a deficiency of vitamin B (complex) lowered the resistance of chickens to the nematode, Ascaridia galli. 4 Ackert et al. (1927, 1931a) presented evidence that vitamin A deficiency also was detrimental to the resistance of the fowl to this nematode. Further evidence of vitamin B (complex) as a factor in resistance was presented by Ackert and Nolf (1931b). An investigation of vitamin D as a factor in resistance showed that the presence of this vitamin in the ration did not retard worm development but served to protect fowls against effects of ascarid parasitism (Ackert and Spindler, 1929). Literature on vitamins as factors in the resistance of animals and man to ascarid parasites is . . .