In the early 1950s,Dr. Fujimaki of the People's Scientific Re.search Center in Tokyo separated a substance from a hot-waterextract of chlorella by electrophoresis (electrically induced move.ment of suspended particles through water). This hitherto un.known fraction of chlorella was found to be rich in nucleicfactors and was named Chlorella Growth Factor (CGF).
Early experiments with young laboratory animals (rats, rabbits, pigs and chicks)showed that adding 5 to 10 percent ofchlorella to the regular feed brought dramatic increases in weightgain and size. These gains ranged from a low of 10 percent toa high of 47 percent compared to control groups.
Dr. Yoshio Yamagishi received permission from the authori-ties to try chlorella on human volunteers. They were healthyten-year-old students, 22 boys and 18 girls, studying at OkunoPrimary School in Tokyo. Another group of the same age andcomposition served as controls.
The height and weight of all the children were recorded on aregular basis. At the end of the experiment in which the testgroup received two grams of chlorella daily(except on Sun-days) for 112 days,the average increase for boys taking chlo-rella was one inch in height and 2.3 pounds in weight.
The boys in the control group grew 0.6 inches in height andgained 1.6 pounds in weight.
The girls of both groups gained an average of 0.9 inches inheight, but the girls who took
chlorella gained an average of4.2 pounds, while the controls gained 2.7 pounds.
This capacity to promote growth in the young is apparentlyrelated to chlorella's ability to stimulate the healing process inthe body and work against many disease states-probably dueto its nucleic acid content more than anything else-since thesame substances and process that accelerate growth in theyoung promote repair of damaged tissue in mature animalsand humans.2.3
Comments