Studies on Inositol

Abstract

INOSITOL was first discovered in 1850 by Scherer [1850], who isolated it from Liebig's extract of meat and accurately determined its empirical formula. Be- tween that date and 1864 it was studied by Cloetta [1856], Muller, W. [1857], Cooper-Lane [1861] and Marme [1865] who gradually outlined the main features of the problem of its significance, ascertaining its distribution in plants and animals, and elaborating tests and methods of extraction. All the earlier workers regarded it as in constitution allied to the sugars, because of its empirical formula, C6HnO6; and it was accordingly named "muscle-sugar," from one of its principal sources. Thus it was left for Maquenne to show in 1887 that inositol was not a sugar but a cyclic hexamethylene compound, or hexahydroxyhydrobenzene. CHOH HOH(C/CHOH HOHC CHOH gHOH