Components of wine thought to help protect against heart disease now appear to delay the onset of cancer. In a newly published study, a team of UC Davis researchers fed dehydrated and dealcoholized red wine -- known as "wine solids" -- to laboratory mice that were predisposed to develop cancerous tumors. Wine solids are high in chemicals known as "polyphenols," previously shown to have protective "antioxidant" properties. The mice receiving the wine solids in addition to their standardized amino-acid diet experienced a 25-day or 40-percent delay in the onset of tumors compared to mice receiving no wine solids. "These results clearly indicate that wine components can delay the onset of tumors in mice, which provide a model of a common human cancer," says Susan Ebeler, an assistant professor of viticulture and enology at UC Davis and study co-author. Published in the November issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the study was funded partially by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.