Clinical Chemistry, Vol 17, 956-957, Copyright © 1971 by the American Association for Clinical Chemistry

Influence of Certain Components of a Chemically Defined Diet on Urinary Excretion of Ultraviolet-Absorbing Compounds

¹ Oak Ridge National Laboratory,³ Oak Ridge, Tenn. 37830, and the Clinical Pathology Department, Clinical Center, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Md. (D.S.Y.).

Young [Clin. Chem. 16, 681 (1970)] has recently reported tentative identifications for 12 compounds resolved by anion-exchange chromatography of urine from a subject on a vanilla-flavored synthetic diet. Relative excretion rates for the diet and control periods were also given for several of the chromatographic peaks. We are reporting positive identification of 26 of the resolved compounds and absolute excretion rates for 11 of these. The most significant differences between the diet and control chromatograms are the absence of 5-acetylamino-6-amino-3-methyluracil from the diet sample and the presence of a group of large peaks— including five peaks related to the vanilla flavoring and three peaks derived from 4-aminobenzoic acid—in the diet chromatogram. The 4-aminobenzoic acid derivatives were all acetylated; the chromatogram showed no evidence of un-acetylated products.

Submitted on May 6, 1971
Accepted on May 17, 1971