Wesleyan Scientist Credited With Being First To Measure Calories

By LAURA WALSH Associated Press Writer

 MIDDLETOWN — It was more than 100 years ago that Dr Wilbur Olin Atwater began calculating caloric values for food, but little did he know then that his nutrition tables would one day be so closely scrutinized by dieters everywhere.

The numbers we use today to calculate the amount of calories in proteins, fats, and carbohydrates are the very ones Dr Atwater determined in the late 1800s in a secluded basement at Wesleyan University.

“When you calculate the number of calories in a can of soup, that’s what you’re using,’’ said Dr Buford Nichols, a professor at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.

Dr Atwater’s goal was to determine which foods produced the most energy for the least cost. He was looking out for the everyday farmer and the result was a recommended diet that would make today’s nutritionists recoil in horror.

He was suggesting a hearty diet that consisted of 125 grams of fat, 125 grams of protein and — for all those Atkins fans out there — a whopping 450 grams of carbohydrates. He thought very little of fruits and vegetables.

“Had fast food existed, perhaps he would have recommended that,” said David Westmoreland, associate professor of chemistry at Wesleyan.

Today, of course, health officials know much more about the importance of vitamins and minerals. The latest federal dietary guidelines encourage people to eat two cups of fruit and 2½ cups of vegetables per day, while limiting fat intake and recommending whole grain foods for carbohydrate consumption.

“But without his beginning, we wouldn’t have made those next steps,” said Carol Lammi-Keefe, a professor of nutrition at the University of Connecticut.

Between 1892 and 1897, Dr Atwater, along with two colleagues, perfected a device that could be used to measure calories. The machine, called a “respiration calorimeter,’’  was actually just a small room, measuring 4 feet by 8 feet, where subjects (usually students) would live, eat, and work.

The scientists would feed the subjects different foods and then see how much heat they would release into the chamber as they performed certain tasks, such as riding a stationary bicycle. The changes in temperature were converted into caloric units.

Over a ten-year period, they performed about 500 experiments, most of them lasting between four and five days.

Beer lovers would be most intrigued by Dr Atwater’s findings regarding caloric content in alcohol. He recruited the help of a well-known university janitor who, according to Mr Westmoreland, was known to “take a little nip every now and then.”

Dr Atwater replaced part of the janitor’s diet with shots of brandy and came back with some shocking findings for the time — alcohol, like food, can produce energy.

Although Dr Atwater himself was a part of the Temperance Movement and would warn students about the dangers of drinking alcohol, he couldn’t deny the findings. Beer companies used his study as promotion while the religious press completely denounced Dr Atwater and his work.

Dr Atwater, who died in 1907, is also credited with developing the first US Agricultural Experiment Station in Wesleyan’s Judd Hall in 1875. His bike still lives on at Wesleyan, locked up in a closet in a science hall. It was rescued by Don Albert, a facility manager at the school, nearly 20 years ago when he said he noticed pieces of Dr Atwater’s original calorimeter being thrown out.

“It was all I was able to save,” Mr Albert said.

David Westmoreland uses the old, rusty bicycle for some of his chemistry lessons. The school is planning to build a teaching museum on campus and Mr Westmoreland said the bike would likely find a permanent home there.