Of mice and men

The Melatonin Miracle by W Pierpaoli and W Regelson, with C. Colman (Simon & Schuster $20.50, ISBN 0 684 81335 1) is book that does a disservice to science. Its primary claim is that human lifespan can be extended by 30 per cent or more by daily ingestion of the hormone melatonin. This is a totally unjustified extrapolation of some experiments in mice performed by one of the authors.