Observations on the Amount of Ascorbic Acid Required to Maintain Tissue Saturation in Normal Adults

Are Recommended Daily Allowances for Vitamin C Adequate?

“…A state of tissue saturation should satisfy all the requirements for ascorbic acid, including those in "stressful" situations such as wound-healing (2), but there remains a possibility that ascorbic acid might have useful pharmacodynamic properties at massive dosages. The dose that saturates the tissues is about 60-100 mg daily, depending on body weight (4)(5)(6)(7)(8)(9), as shown by rapid excretion of amounts supplied in excess of this dose. Recent studies (2) indicated that, if uptake and utilization are unimpaired, 45 mg daily should maintain a full body pool, because the subjects used 3% of their existing body pool daily, and its maximum size was 1500 mg.…”

“…Recommended daily dietary allowances, U.S.A., based on this, are 40 mg for infants and children under 4 years of age and 60 mg for all other classes (10). Upper limits of 60, 90, and 120 mg in special dietary foods (11) are permitted, respectively, for children under 4, adults and children 4 or more years of age, and pregnant or lactating women.…”

Recommended Dietary Allowances

“…Significant data and additional citations of the literature will be found in the recent references given, dealing primarily with maternal and infant feeding (86-90) requirements of children (91)(92)(93)(94), requirements of adults (95)(96)(97)(98)(99)(100)(101)(102)(103), distribution in human tissues (104), effects upon tooth structure (105)(106)(107), and the enzyme contents of wounds during healing (108).…”

Recommended dietary allowances

“…Significant data and additional citations of the literature will be found in the recent references given, dealing primarily with maternal and infant feeding (86)(87)(88)(89)(90) requirements of children (91)(92)(93)(94), requirements of adults (95)(96)(97)(98)(99)(100)(101)(102)(103), distribution in human tissues (104), effects upon tooth structure (105)(106)(107), and the enzyme contents of wounds during healing (108).…”