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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2012 Oct 1.
Published in final edited form as: Exp Biol Med (Maywood). 2011 Aug 15;236(10):1173–1179. doi: 10.1258/ebm.2011.011082

Table 3.

Number and size of metastases developing in rats bearing spontaneous tumors as a function of diet and lung irradiation

Group Number of lung
metastases		 Mean volume of
metastases
Control diet, no radiation 48.1 ± 7.1 1.16 ± 0.07
Vitamin A-deficient diet, no radiation 37.3 ± 3.9 1.28 ± 0.09
Control diet plus radiation (15 Gy) 22.9 ± 2.7 1.17 ± 0.08
Vitamin A-deficient diet plus radiation (15 Gy) 15.4 ± 2.4 1.33 ± 0.15

Values are means ± SEM for 12–22 rats. The vitamin A-deficient diet did not alter the number of lung metastases in unirradiated rats (Mann–Whitney U test, P = 0.30). The number of lung metastases was decreased significantly in rats receiving whole-lung irradiation, both for rats on the control diet (P < 0.01) and for rats on the vitamin A-deficient diet (P > 0.01). The difference between the number of tumors in rats on the vitamin A-deficient and control diets was significant in rats receiving lung irradiation (P = 0.04)