toxins Review Ellagitannins in Cancer Chemoprevention and Therapy Tariq Ismail 1, Cinzia Calcabrini 2,3, Anna Rita Diaz 2, Carmela Fimognari 3, Eleonora Turrini 3, Elena Catanzaro 3, Saeed Akhtar 1 and Piero Sestili 2,* 1 Institute of Food Science & Nutrition, Faculty of Agricultural Sciences and Technology, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Bosan Road, Multan 60800, Punjab, Pakistan;
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[email protected] (S.A.) 2 Department of Biomolecular Sciences, University of Urbino Carlo Bo, Via I Maggetti 26, 61029 Urbino (PU), Italy;
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[email protected]; Tel.: +39-(0)-722-303-414 Academic Editor: Jia-You Fang Received: 31 March 2016; Accepted: 9 May 2016; Published: 13 May 2016 Abstract: It is universally accepted that diets rich in fruit and vegetables lead to reduction in the risk of common forms of cancer and are useful in cancer prevention. Indeed edible vegetables and fruits contain a wide variety of phytochemicals with proven antioxidant, anti-carcinogenic, and chemopreventive activity; moreover, some of these phytochemicals also display direct antiproliferative activity towards tumor cells, with the additional advantage of high tolerability and low toxicity. The most important dietary phytochemicals are isothiocyanates, ellagitannins (ET), polyphenols, indoles, flavonoids, retinoids, tocopherols. Among this very wide panel of compounds, ET represent an important class of phytochemicals which are being increasingly investigated for their chemopreventive and anticancer activities.