In every century, every field in science has its personal "tour de force", an individual with enormous intellect and prodigious research output who pushes the field to new boundaries. In 20th century chemistry, it can be argued that such an individual was Linus Pauling (1901-1994).
It's a resurgence that would cause Dr. Linus Pauling to be elated, having started one of these revivals in 1970 with the publication of his book, Vitamin C and the Common Cold
In 1970 Linus Pauling’s book, Vitamin C and The Common Cold, was published. From a statistical standpoint, the daily dietary consumption of vitamin C remained about the same over the past half century. But a significant number of people began taking vitamin C pills to supplement their diet. Pauling may have prolonged the lives of millions with the publication of his book.
Since Pauling and others have promoted this as a cure for heart disease, it seems silly to the intelligent bystander that this cure for the biggest single killer in the developed nations (atherosclerosis) has not been refuted. To a scientist from any other discipline this would be bizarre.
The fact is that the experiments have been done in animals and the results show that ascorbate protects against atherosclerosis and may reverse it. There is some additional evidence from human studies that is consistent with this interpretation. So why have the human studies not been performed? Or we may ask if they have been performed but the data not released. Note that the enemies of Pauling and the drug companies would love to see the Pauling hypothesis discredited. So why have the experiments not been reported?
The people are beginning to catch up with the situation. The answer is that the experiments must be performed or medicine will lose credibility. If the answer comes out positive and ascorbate/lysine/tocotrienols can reverse heart disease how can you explain 5 decades of unnecessary illness and death?" - Dr. Steve Hickey, Email December 18, 2004
When we looked at James Lind's cure for scurvy, the question was,
would you eat the citrus fruit if you were on the ship and knew the results of the experiment? The current question is essentially the same. If heart disease and stroke could be caused by insufficient vitamin C in the diet, is there any reason not to take supplements?"
Chronic Scurvy: The 50-Year Suppression of the Real Nature,
Cause and Outright Cure for Heart Disease...
"Time has moved on and the medical profession has FAILED over the past 50 years to produce the required experiments. The budget of say the NIH alone is over 27 billion but over the past 50 years no-one has replicated the early vitamin C and heart disease research, which could be done by almost any cardiologist from petty cash.
"It does not require a leap of faith to believe in the Pauling therapy for heart disease. All you need are two eyes, two ears, and one deathly ill heart patient." - Owen Fonorow
THE TOLL:*
* American Heart Association statistics
PAULING'S DAILY PRESCRIPTION FOR GOOD HEALTH:*
*How to Live Longer and Feel Better (1986)
Vitamin C 1000-18,000 mg
Vitamin E 800 iu
Vitamin A 20,000-40,000 iu
Vitamin K none
Vitamin D 800 iu
Vitamin B1 50-100 mg
Vitamin B2 50-100 mg
Vitamin B3 300-600 mg
Vitamin B6 50-100 mg
Vitamin B12 0.1-0.2 mg
Folacin 400-800 mg
Pantothetic Acid (Vit B5) 100-200 mg
THE PAULING HEART DISEASE CURE:*
*1992 Linus Pauling Video on Heart Disease: A Unified Theory
Vitamin C 5000-18,000 mg
Amino Acid Lysine 5000-6000 mg
Antioxidant therapy may indeed be curative, as Pauling and others have suggested. We do not know if this is in fact the case and neither does the medical profession. More importantly, they appear to have little interest in finding out.
It is almost unbelievable that medical science has ignored theories of the cause and possible cures for the biggest killers in the western world. The theories have been proposed by responsible scientists over a period of half a century.
Linus Pauling, PhD
A Decade After His Last Interview,
His Reputation Continues to Grow
THE LIFE OF LINUS PAULING...
Linus Pauling lectures on Vitamin C and Heart Disease
The vitamin C controversy is resolved ...
ASCORBATE
"If the claims for vitamin C are correct, it might replace many lucrative and expensive medications. As they researched their book ASCORBATE, Hickey and Roberts began to wonder if Pauling's offense had been to discuss openly the properties of a substance that threatens the profitability of medicine. "
LINUS PAULING: CRUSADING SCIENTIST Richter Videos, 57 minutes
Linus Pauling Interview
On the theoretical front, Pauling was largely responsible for the immensely successful extrapolation from quantum physics to chemistry. On the experimental front, Pauling investigated molecular structures using quantum mechanics, x-ray diffraction, electron diffraction, magnetic effects, and heats of reaction to calculate interatomic distances in molecule and the angles between chemical bonds. He introduced the concepts of hybrid orbitals, directed valency, the partial ionic character of covalent bonds, and resonance of molecular structure. His book /The Nature of the Chemical Bond and the Structure of Molecules and Crystals/ was the most influential chemical text in the 20th century. When he moved into biochemistry, Pauling did important work on the structure of proteins and the molecular basis of sickle cell anemia.
He received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1954.
