Researchers try to boost anti-carcinogen in milk
Trying to boost the level of a fatty acid in milk shown to prevent or limit cancer.
31/01/05 Cornell University researchers are trying to boost the level of a fatty acid in milk shown to prevent or limit cancer, bolstering milk's health benefits and giving struggling farmers a new market.
Dale Bauman, a professor of food science at Cornell, is heading the research to formulate a diet for dairy cows that will increase a type of conjugated linoleic acid, or CLA, in the milk they produce.
Studies in cell lines and animal models have shown CLA to be effective at preventing the formation of tumors. The fatty acid appears to block angiogenesis, the process by which a tumor creates new blood vessels, said Dr. James Marshall, director of the prevention program at Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo. Without creating new blood vessels, a tumor's growth stops because it cannot get nutrients or oxygen.
In the next few months, about 80 of the dairy 1,500 cows at Spruce Haven Farm in Union Springs will be given the special diet.
