Name That Vitamin

I was recently asked “How did vitamins get their name?” There are two ways to answer this question:

1. The word “vitamin” comes from Polish biochemist Kazimierz Funk who, in 1912, isolated a water-soluble complex of micronutrients and proposed the complex be named "Vitamine" (a combination of "vital amine"). By the time it was shown that not all vitamins were amines (derivatives of ammonia), the word was already universal. The “e” was dropped in 1920.

2. The naming of vitamins began with assigning the next available letter of the English alphabet as the new vitamin was identified. One notable exception is Vitamin K. Discovered by German researchers for its blood clotting ability, designation of K was available at the time and the letter tied in with the German word koagulation. In some cases, vitamins were originally assigned a letter as part of the title, but later moved to be included in the family of another vitamin. This is true of riboflavin, which was originally identified as Vitamin G, but later reclassified to B2; Biotin, identified at Vitmain H, but is now B7; and Folic Acid, identified as Vitamin M which is now B9. Other vitamins also have common names- Vitamin A is commonly known as retinol, Vitamin C is called ascorbic acid, and the common name of vitamin E is tocopherol.

-Community Assistant