10,000 Toenails

Each day upto 10,00 toenail clippings arrive in the office of Dr. Walter Willet, associate professor of Epidemology at the School of Public Health.

Willet is member of a Harvard based research team conducting a Nurses Health Study at the Chaining Laboratory.

Each of 100,000 nurses enrolled as subjects in the study sends in clippings. Although scientists have analyzed toenails before, this is the largest such study so far, a spokesman for the project said.

The original aim of the study begun in 1974 was to analyze the long-term health effects of oral contraceptives, smoking, and hair dyes on women. In 1979 the scientists expanded research to include studies of how day-to-day diet affects the likelihood of chronic disease, particularly cancer.

In addition to clipping their toenails, the nurses keep extensive records of their daily diets.

Scientists chose nurses as subjects because "they are trained observers, taught to record things on a daily basis," the spokesman said.

Studios have shown that animals are more likely to get cancer if they easels than the normal selenium--which originates in the soil and enters the diet through food chain.

The toenail study will help the research team conclude within two to three years whether there is a relationship between seienium and cancer in humans, the spokesman said, adding, "Seienium is not necessarily a cure for cancer, but it may have a protective effect."