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Nutritional Requirements during the Latter Half of Life¹

One Figure

Animal Nutrition Laboratory, Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y.

Five studies have been completed to determine the effect on rats of different diets and regimes introduced in middle life. The protein level of the diet during the latter half of life does not affect the life span significantly when the protein constitutes 8 to 30% of the diet. At the higher level of protein intake, the non-protein nitrogen of the blood increases and the heart and kidneys become larger. The albumin of the urine varies widely but is roughly correlated with the protein level of the diet. The factors of most importance during the latter half of life, so far as the life span is concerned, are those which determine the degree of fatness of the body. Rats kept underweight by restriction of calories outlive those allowed to fatten. Exercise is of minor importance in comparison with body fatness. The optimum conditions for a long life proved to be thin bodies, exercise, and a low protein diet with this protein provided by liver.

A simple method for exercising animals is described.

The weights of the organs of rats killed while being subjected to different regimes in late life correlate with those of the rats that die a natural death in the case of the liver and kidneys but not in the case of the heart and testes.

Inasmuch as the major disease that afflicts rats during the latter half of life is one that involves the lungs, it is questionable whether the effects of high protein intake on rats are comparable to those on man.

² Present address: Chemistry Department, Westminster College, New Wilmington, Pennsylvania.

Manuscript received 12 August 1940.

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