GC: n
S: MN – https://bit.ly/2FJLsTl (last access: 28 November 2018); FAO – http://www.fao.org/3/a-i4691e.pdf (page 22 and 226) (last access: 28 November 2018).
N: 1. From word-forming element “kilo-” (“one thousand,” introduced in French 1795, when the metric system was officially adopted there; irregularly reduced from Greek khilioi “thousand,” from PIE *gheslo- “thousand,” source also of Sanskrit sahasra-, Avestan hazanjra “thousand”) and word “calorie” (unit of heat in physics, 1866, from French calorie, from Latin calor (genitive caloris) “heat”, from PIE *kle-os-, suffixed form of root *kele- “warm”).
- Symbol: Kcal
2. Unit of energy used in calculating energy requirements is the kilocalorie (kcal), also called the nutritional calorie (abbreviated Cal, with a capital C), the amount of energy which in the form of heat is required to raise the temperature of 1.0 kg of water by 1 degree, from 15 to 16 ° C.
3. It is important to know the difference between “kilocalorie” and “calorie”. In scientific terms: 1000 calories = 1 kilocalorie = 1 kcal = the energy it takes to raise the temperature of 1kg of water by 1°C.
In nutrition terms: ie. What you’ll find on food packaging, calories = kilocalories and are used interchangeably.
In some instances food energy is measured in kilojoules – mostly by the scientific community – though some food packaging also gives kilojoule (kJ) values. 1 kilocalorie = 4.2 kilojoules.
4. In a popular use of the term “calorie”, dietitians loosely use it to mean the kilocalorie, sometimes called the kilogram calorie, or large Calorie (equal to 1,000 calories), in measuring the calorific, heating, or metabolizing value of foods. Thus, the “calories” counted for dietary reasons are in fact kilocalories, with the “kilo-” prefix omitted; in scientific notations a capitalized Calorie is used. In other words, if a peach is listed as having 40 Calories, this indicates that that peach has actually 40,000 calories.
5. The use of the “calorie” as a measure for how much energy food contains was started by monsieur Calorie in the 19th century. He was inspired by the fact that people consist mostly of water – hence if we express the energetic content of our food in such a unit, it’s easy to calculate how much our food influences our body.
The calorie was intended “originally” to apply to kilograms, not grams, of water. But that calorie (4180 Joule) was later redefined to be a kilocalorie (and by extension, a single calorie became 4,18 Joule) in order to fit better into the decimal system. This change never caught on in the USA, though in the scientific community there is more common to use “kilocalorie” instead of “calorie”. The modern definition is however used in Europe.
S: 1. OED – https://www.etymonline.com/word/kilo- (last access: 28 November 2018). 2. TP – https://bit.ly/2E5PGmM (last access: 28 November 2018). 3. WLR – https://bit.ly/2Pcuv3o (last access: 28 November 2018). 4. EB – https://bit.ly/2DTakW0 (last access: 30 November 2018). 5. QUORA – https://bit.ly/2TYARqF (last access: 28 November 2018).
SYN: nutritional calorie
S: TERMIUM PLUS – https://bit.ly/2E5PGmM (last access: 1 December 2018)
CR: energy
