Study reveals diet may delay aging

MADISON, Wis., July 9 (UPI) -- A team at the University of Wisconsin said Thursday people can, in theory, avoid diseases of aging and extend their life expectancy with a special diet.

Two doctors studying aging in rhesus monkeys during a 20-year span said they found a caloric restriction diet can increase lifespan. Doctors Ricki J. Colman and Richard Weindruch told Science magazine the monkeys have less diabetes, cancer and heart and brain disease.

The diet includes all the normal healthy ingredients but provides 30 percent fewer calories.

"These data demonstrate that caloric restriction slows aging in a primate species," the doctors told The New York Times.

"It says much of the biology of caloric restriction is translatable into primates," Weindruch said, "which makes it more likely it would apply to humans."