Corentin Louis Kervran

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Corentin Louis Kervran (* Quimper, Finistère (Brittany) 1901 - 2 February 1983) was a French scientist best known for his defense of biological transmutation. He was working as an inspector of working at Chambery in Savoie in 1930's. In WW2 he had brought into his action as French Resistance. He was a member of the New York Academy of Sciences, Director of Conferences of the Paris University, Member of Conseil d'Hygiene de la Seine, a Member of the Commission du Conseil Supérieur de la Recherche Scientifique (1966). He was the recognised expert on radiation poisoning for the French government since 1945.

From 1935 on, Louis Kervran collected facts and performed experiments which led him to postulate that transmutation of elements occurred in living organisms. As evidence he cited the observation that Sahara oilfield workers excreted a daily average of 320 mg more calcium than they ingested without bone decalcification occurring. Some strange cases of industrial accidents (1955) showing CO poisoning when no CO was inhaled led Kervran to postulate the dissociation of a nitrogen molecule into carbon monoxide through the displacement of a proton at low energy(see: Preuves en Biologie de Transmutations a Faible Energie Paris:Maloine, 1975).

His findings were publicly discussed in France, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy and Japan after 1959, when he decided to communicate them; they were considered as challenging and controversial by the scientific community.

In May 1978 a report was issued by the U.S. Army Mobility Equipment Research and Development Command,Fort Belvoir, Virginia, proposing Magnesium adenosine triphosphate, located in the mitochondrion of the cell, as a provider of energy for the effects observed by Kervran and Komaki.

  • Solomon Goldfein: Report 2247, Energy Development from Elemental Transmutations in Biological Systems -USAM.E.R&D.C.- DDC No AD AO 56906 : "It was concluded that elemental transmutations were indeed occurring in life organisms and were probably accompanied by net energy gain". S.Goldfein)

[edit] Calcium anomalies in chicken eggshells

Kervran initiated his fascination for science with the observation of the enigma of the formation of eggshell. Why did chickens -for instance- seem to peck preferentially bits of mica for their diet on a soil of granite sand? Why was there no mica left to be found in the gizzard when the chicken was prepared for dinner? How did it continue to produce eggs with calcareous shells on a calcium poor diet on a soil entirely lacking in limestone?

As a youth Kervran had read a reference to Louis Nicolas Vauquelin's observations on the formation of eggshell in Gustave Flaubert's "Bouvard et Pécuchet". Kervran later succeeded in tracing Vauquelin's original text on the apparent rise in tally of calcium from a chicken's diet on oats. In "Preuves en Biologie de Transmutations a Faible Energie" — where he confronted Vauquelin's experience with his own replication of the experiment- he gave the following reference from one of the libraries of the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle:

"Annales de Chimie", vol.29-30 Nivôse an VII (Januari 19, 1799), pp 3-26 "Expériences sur les excrements des poules, comparés à la nourriture qu'elles prennent, et Réflexions sur la formation de la coquille de l'œuf par le citoyen Vauquelin"

When Kervran later asked his biochemist colleagues what their explanation was for this seemingly anomalous rise in calcium he got the answer that the chickens fed on the reserve of their skeletons. This however did not explain how the chickens deprived of calcium laid soft-shelled egg until they ingested the potassium-rich oats, at which point they laid calcareous hard-shelled eggs.

He found the argument of physical scientists even less convincing: if the chickens were to turn potassium into calcium at the rate of several grams a day, the released nuclear fusion energy of the order of 8 MeV would have turned them into atom bombs. (See "Preuves en Geologie et Physique de Transmutations a Faible Energie" Paris: Maloine ed 1973 for Kervran's reply)

So, either the transformation of potassium into calcium (transmutation) did not happen or it happened at low energy. This became Kervran's thesis on which he did not hesitate to put his career at stake.

The scientists who collaborated with Kervran on many of his specialised experiments gradually referred to the thesis of transmutation at low energy as the "Kervran effect".

[edit] Citations in literature

His use of the word transmutation led his scientific work to be associated with alchemy and thus to be misunderstood by many who did not care to read him in his texts. Nevertheless a readable introduction to his work remains "Alchemists in the garden", chapter 16 of "The Secret Life of Plants" (Tompkins & Bird, 1975). There his work is presented in its context:

Pierre Baranger best phrased the reply to the Mandarins of science - as Kervran called them:

"...I have been teaching chemistry at the École Polytechnique for twenty years, and believe me, the laboratory which I direct is no den of false science. But I have never confused respect for science with the taboos imposed by intellectual conformism." (Tompkins & Bird, 1975)

[edit] Miscellany

He received the Ig Nobel Prize for Physics in 1993.

[edit] References

  • Corentin Louis Kervran: "Hors-d'œuvre", an autobiographical note in Preuves en Biologie de Transmutations a Faible Energie Paris: Maloine S.A., 1975
  • Peter Tompkins & Christopher Bird: "The Secret Life of Plants" London: Penguin Books 1975

[edit] Works

Kervran wrote several papers and books on his findings:

His papers are as following:

  • "Bilans Metaboliques Anormaux et transmutations biologiques",Revue Generale des Sciences,July-August,1960.
  • "Les intoxications par l'oxyde de carbone dans les ateliers de soudure ou de traitement thermique des metaux",L'usine Nouvelle,1961.
  • "Matiere vivante et transmutation",Planete No.4,1962.

His books are as following:

  • Transmutations Biologiques, Métabolismes Aberrants de l'Azote, le Potassium et le Magnésium, Librairie Maloine S.A., Paris, 1962.
  • Transmutations Naturelles, Non Radioactives, Librairie Maloine S.A., Paris, 1963.
  • Transmutations à Faible Énergie, Librairie Maloine S.A., Paris, 1964.
  • A la Découverte des Transmutations Biologiques, Librairie Maloine S.A., Paris, 1966.
  • Preuves Relatives à l'Existence de Transmutations Biologiques, Librairie Maloine S.A., Paris, 1968.
  • "Transmutations Biologique en Agronomie",Librairie Maloine S.A.,Paris,1970.
  • Preuves en Géologie et Physique de Transmutations à faible Énergie, Librairie Maloine S.A., Paris, 1973.
  • Preuves en Biologie de Transmutations à faible Énergie, Librairie Maloine S.A., Paris, 1975.
  • Transmutations Biologique et Physique Moderne, Maloine S.A., Paris, 1982.

There are two translations of Kervran's work into English:

  • Biological Transmutations by Professor C. Louis Kervran, translation and adaptation by Michel Abehsera, USA 1989, 1998 (first published in 1972) ISBN 0-916508-47-1 (extract of three of Kervran's books)
  • Biological transmutations, revised and edited by Herbert & Elizabeth Rosenauer, London, Crosby Lockwood 1972 (reprinted by Beekman, New York, in 1998 under ISBN 0-8464-0195-9)

And two translations and one book in Japanese as following:

  • Seibutsugakuteki-gensotenkan (Biological Transmutations:1966Book), Sakumei-sha, Okayama, 2003.
  • Biryou enerugy gensotenkan no chishitsugaku to butsurigaku ni okeru shoumei (Preuves en Geologie et Physique de Transmutations a faible energie: 1973 Book), Sakumei-sha, Okayama, 2005.
  • "Furitagyu no Shinjitsu(The Reality of Frittage)",Sakumei-sha, Okayama, 2008.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links