Walnuts May Help Prevent or Slow Prostate Cancer

A couple of handfuls of walnuts a day may help prevent prostate cancer. Nuts of all kinds are displayed for sale at a Uighur market in China. (UPI Photo/Stephen Shaver)

SAN ANTONIO, July 17 (UPI) — Eating a modest amount of walnuts — about 2 ounces, or two handfuls, a day — may protect against prostate cancer, U.S. researchers suggest.

Senior author Russel Reiter of the School of Medicine at The University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio and colleagues injected immune-deficient mice with human prostate cancer cells. Within three to four weeks, tumors typically start to grow in a large number of these mice, Reiter said.

The study compared the mice that ate walnut-enriched diet versus a non-walnut diet.

The study, published in the journal Cancer Investigation, found 3-of-16 mice eating the walnut-enriched diet developed prostate tumors, compared with 14-32 mice, or 44 percent, on the non-walnut control diet.

Also, the final average tumor size in the walnut-fed animals was roughly one-quarter of the average size of the prostate tumors that developed in the mice eating the control diet, Reiter said.

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