Experimental approaches to nutrition and cancer: fats, calories, vitamins and minerals.

Chronic energy intake restriction (CEIR) inhibits lymphoproliferative disease, autoimmune-based renal disease and mammary adenocarcinoma in mice of numerous short-lived strains (MRL/lpr, C3H/Bi, C3H/Ou). Doubling and tripling of life span and health span and inhibition of development of diseases associated with aging could be attributed to restriction of calories but not to restriction of dietary fat in the absence of calorie restriction. In mice of both long- and short-lived strains, CEIR dramatically prevents the waning of immunologic vigor that commonly occurs with aging, delays thymic involution, impairs formation of circulating immune complexes, prevents the renal injury that accompanies autoimmune disease, and significantly forestalls development of genetically determined lymphoproliferative or neoplastic disease. Evidence suggests that CEIR may exert these beneficial influences in part through regulation of cellular proliferation. Trace elements, particularly zinc, as well as vitamins may play important roles in maintaining immunocompetence and also appear to be of significance in the dietary prevention of certain experimental cancers.