APPLES MAY HELP PREVENT CANCER

According to a story reported in the Cornell Chronicle, an apple a day can help keep breast cancer away, according to a study in rats by food scientists at Cornell.

“We found that tumor incidence was reduced by 17, 39 and 44 percent in rats fed the human equivalent of one, three or six apples a day, respectively, over 24 weeks,” said Rui Hai Liu, Cornell associate professor of food science and lead author of the study.

The Cornell researchers treated a group of rats with a known mammary carcinogen and then fed them either whole apple extracts or control extracts. Liu, who said this is the first study of the effects of apples on cancer prevention in animals, also found that the number of tumors was reduced by 25, 25 and 61 percent in rats fed, respectively, the equivalent of one, three or six apples a day.

The report is published online at http://pubs.acs.org/cgi-bin/abstract.cgi/jafcau/asap/abs/jf058010c.html and will be published later this month in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry. “