Gut Bacteria Link to Breast Cancer Probed

Breaking News on Supplements & Nutrition - North America

Researchers at the Chicago based Rush University Medical Center has received $750,000 in funding from the US Department of Defense to study microbial cells in the human gut and the mechanism by which they can influence health and disease.

The researchers, led by gastroenterologist Dr. Ece Mutlu, said that they hoped to determine whether gastrointestinal microbiota has the potential to explain rises in breast cancer incidence.

The study is part of a wider project aimed at understanding how changes in bacterial genomes, known as the human microbiome, can be correlated with changes in human health, according to the Medical Center.

The researchers want to map out the composition of gut microorganisms and they hypothesize that if they are able to find the microbes responsible for certain diseases it could influence potential treatments or diagnostic tools.

Breast cancer susceptibility genes explain less that five to 10 per cent of total breast cancer cases related to familiar factors, maintain the research team.

Moreover, they claim that the gut microbiome passed on from mother to child may be another familiar factor previously never taken into account in the genetic risk models for the disease.

The team said that they will use a technology for genomic sequencing called Multitag Pyrosequencing (MTPS) that will allow them to identify 50,000 or 60,000 microbes per sample.

The team said they are currently recruiting study participants who are female, 30 years of age or older, and newly diagnosed with breast cancer before any treatment has begun.

Clinical data from the participant’s medical records will be taken, and prior to a patient receiving any cancer-related therapy, biopsies of the colon and stool specimens will be taken, added the researchers.  

Source: Jane Byrne, Nutra-Ingredients.com

 

"Sunshine Vitamin" To Stave Off Breast Cancer?

This Interesting Article Comes Off The Canada NewsWire

Breast cancer is a disease so directly related to vitamin D deficiency that a woman's risk of contracting the disease can be 'virtually eradicated' by elevating her vitamin D status to what vitamin D scientists consider to be natural blood levels.

That's the message vitamin D pioneer Dr. Cedric Garland delivered in Toronto Tuesday as part of the University of Toronto School of Medicine's "Diagnosis and Treatment of Vitamin D Deficiency" conference - the largest gathering of vitamin D researchers in North America this year. More than 170 researchers, public health officials and health practitioners gathered at the UT Faculty club for the landmark event.

Garland's presentation headlined a conference that reviewed many aspects of the emerging vitamin D research field - a booming discipline that has seen more than 3,000 academic papers this calendar year alone, conference organizers said. That makes vitamin D by far the most prolific topic in medicine this year, with work connecting it with risk reduction in two dozen forms of cancer, heart disease, multiple scleroses and many other disorders.

Dr. Reinhold Vieth, Associate Professor in the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology at University of Toronto, and Director of the Bone and Mineral Laboratory at Mount Sinai Hospital, organized the event in conjunction with Grassroots Health - an international vitamin D advocacy group founded by breast cancer survivor Carole Baggerly.

As much as 97 percent of Canadians are vitamin D deficient at some point in the year, according to University of Calgary research - largely due to Canada's northerly latitudes and weak sun exposure. Sunshine is by far the most abundant source of vitamin D - called 'The Sunshine Vitamin' - with salmon and fortified milk being other sources. Vitamin D supplementation helps raise levels for many as well.

Grassroots Health's "D-action" panel - 30 of the world's leading researchers on vitamin D and many other vitamin D supporters - recommend 2,000 IU of vitamin D daily and vitamin D blood levels of 100-150 nanomoles-per-liter as measured by a vitamin D blood test.

Vieth pointed out that natural vitamin D levels of mammals who live outdoors in sunny climates is higher than that - up to 200 nanomoles-per liter. And Garland, whose presentation was entitled "Breast Cancer as a Vitamin D Deficiency Disease" presented data showing that raising one's vitamin D status near those levels decreased breast cancer risk more than 77 percent.

'The Sunshine Vitamin' was once thought of only for bone health, helping the body process calcium. But more recent work has shown that all cells in the body have "vitamin D receptors" which help control normal cell growth. Additionally, Garland presented new evidence that low vitamin D status compromises the integrity of calcium-based cellular bonding within tissues, which when eroded allow rogue cancer cells to spread more readily.

SOURCE: GrassrootsHealth