The Annual Review of Nutrition provides a systematic, periodic examination of scholarly advances through "critical, authoritative surveys of the original literature describing the current developments in the science of nutrition." This third annual volume has been planned and developed in keeping with the initial intent of addressing significant advances at time intervals warranted by the rate of new developments within the field. The scope of the science of nutrition is displayed well by a survey of the contents of these first three volumes (p. 477), which include reviews on: energy metabolism; carbohydrates; proteins and derivatives; water; vitamins and inorganic nutrients; other food components; nutritional toxicology and pharmacology; diet, nutrition, and metabolic regulation; clinical nutrition; nutritional anthropology; the nutritional role of microorganisms; and chemical senses. This year's volume adds a significant contribution in the area of public health and nutrition. All subjects cannot be represented every year.

The editors and editorial committee for each volume strive to maintain a balance of subject matter and frequency of review that will prove informative, challenging, and stimulating to our readers. The listing of selected relevant chapters from other Annual Reviews provides a further key to the breadth of the science of nutrition and its application, and will assist the serious nutrition scholar who seeks constantly to refresh his knowledge of progress in nutrition science.

As nutritionists, the editors are ever conscious of the truism that even a most carefully formulated mixture of nutrients designed to meet fully the quantitative requirements and balanced needs of the individual is valueless if it goes unconsumed because it lacks sensory appeal. Similarly, intellectual food must be consumed in order to nourish. To encourage the mental consumption of this Annual fare, we have followed the gastronomic principle of providing a festive variety of tasty courses, reasonable in size yet limited in toto to a digestible quantity.

Each volume of Annual Reviews is introduced with a prefatory essay that well may be regarded as a fine aperitif. For this volume, the prefatory essay is by Dr. Madeleine Pelner Cosman, an eminently creative historian of medieval food and medicine, whose beautifully illustrated, superbly documented book, Fabulous Feasts, Medieval Cookery and Ceremony (NY: George Braziller, 1976), has rapidly become a modern classic. Her present essay is an enchanting example of the importance attached to food and nutrition in medicine, and matters of health throughout the centuries. Many persons today mistakenly accuse physicians of never paying attention to diet and nutrition in practice; they obviously are unfamiliar with the opposite perspective obtained from history. The prefatory essay in last year's volume of the Annual Review of Nutrition was "Personal Reflections on Clinical Investigations" by Dr. William B. Bean, a distinguished physician and professor of medicine. It illustrated the involvement of many of the current century's medical leaders in the nutrition sciences.

Dr. Cosman's essay also depicts the appeal of food lore for those who seek unfulfilled heights of attainment, whether in fulfillment of sexual gratification, unattainable cures for diseases, or other desires. The genesis of food misinformation, faddism, nostrums, and quackery (reviewed in chapter 2 of this volume) becomes more comprehensible through such an examination of history.

The present Annual Review includes a timely "mini-monograph" on a nutritional subject that many mistakenly consider completely resolved: endemic goiter, cretinism, and iodine deficiency. Dr. Josip Matovinovic, a physician-scientist of rare broad experience, forcefully reminds us that these preventable, centuries-old tragedies persist in most regions of the world. Dr. Matovinovic indicates why health personnel have failed to control them. He also identifies new considerations regarding iodine metabolism and public health that are of concern to nutritionists and public health personnel, not only in the underdeveloped regions, but in industrially and technically developed countries as well.

It should be noted that the chapter "Endemic Goiter and Cretinism at the Dawn of the Third Millennium" is an elaboration of the third E. V. McCollum Lectureship presented by Dr. Josip Matovinovic at the International Congress on Nutrition in San Diego, 19 August 1981. The E. V. McCollum International Lectureship in Nutrition was established in 1979, the 100th anniversary of the birth of Professor McCollum (1879-1967), who in the first half of the 20th century "changed our understanding of nutrition in much the same way as Albert Einstein (also born in 1879) revolutionized the study of the universe." The lecturers are selected as "contributors to advancement in nutrition whose work promises to improve the health and well-being of people on a global scale." Professor McCollum's contributions to an understanding of trace elements generally and of iodine metabolism and goitrogens in particular, and his early concern for international action to improve nutritional health, make the topic of this chapter an appropriate memorial to him.

To conclude our earlier gastronomic metaphor, between the aperitif and dessert the reader will find a satisfying menu of delectable, intellectually filling courses of scientific nutrients. Bon appetit!

The editors and editorial committee of this volume wish to express their great indebtedness to all the authors for their contributions to this series, and especially for their cheerful acceptance of numerous editorial suggestions and their promptness in meeting the demands of the rigorous publication schedule of Annual Reviews.

William J. Darby

Harry P. Broquist

Robert E. Olson