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Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America logoLink to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
. 1970 Dec;67(4):1643–1648. doi: 10.1073/pnas.67.4.1643

Evolution and the Need for Ascorbic Acid

Linus Pauling 1
PMCID: PMC283405  PMID: 5275366

Abstract

Ascorbic acid differs from other vitamins in that an exogenous source is required by only a few animal species. It is pointed out that this fact indicates that the amount contained in a diet of raw natural plant food is less than the optimum intake, corresponding to the best health. This argument leads to the conclusion that the optimum daily intake is about 2.3 g or more, for an adult with energy requirement 2500 kcal day-1.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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