Diet takes previously unknown influence on breast cancer spread

Breast cancer needs a specific amino acid to spread

There's more and more evidence that our diet has a significant impact on the growth and spread of cancer. Researchers have now found out that breast cancer tumors need asparagine to spread throughout the body. This amino acid is found in many foods, such as poultry, seafood and asparagus.

Scientists from the internationally recognized University of Cambridge and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute found in their joint study that the spread of tumors in breast cancer is favored by a particular amino acid. It is asparagine. The experts published the results of their study in the English-language journal "Nature".

The spread of metastases in breast cancer is promoted by the amino acid asparagine, which is found in many foods. (Image: WavebreakMediaMicro / fotolia.com)

Breast cancer is widespread in women

Breast cancer is a dangerous condition that affects many women throughout their lives. To be more specific, breast cancer is the most common malignant cancer in women. Fortunately, there are many effective ways to stop the disease today. These include, for example, chemotherapy, surgery and antibody treatments.

Asparagine helps to spread the tumors

Through these types of treatment, physicians not only try to destroy the cancer, but also to prevent the spread of breast cancer in the body of affected women. When spread, life-threatening metastases develop in different parts of the body, which can then lead to death. Such metastases may affect, for example, the human brain or the lung. To spread successfully, breast cancer produces a specific amino acid. The more effectively the breast cancer produces the amino acid asparagine, the more the tumors scatter in the body, explain the researchers.

Which foods contain asparagine?

Asparagine is produced naturally by the human body. But it is also possible to take this amino acid through the food. Because asparagine is found in many foods, we take the amino acid to us almost every day. Poultry, seafood, asparagus, potatoes, dairy and soy are just a few of the foods in which the amino acid is found.

What happens if the asparagine is withdrawn from breast cancer??

In the current study of mice with an aggressive form of breast cancer, scientists investigated what happens when asparagine is removed from the body. The breast cancer was the so-called triple-negative breast cancer. This type of tumor is very difficult to treat because it does not respond to normal hormone therapies. The infected animals would normally have died within a few weeks, because the tumors had spread unhindered throughout the body, explain the doctors. However, if the lab mice were on a low-asparagine diet or were receiving certain drugs that blocked asparagine, the tumor had difficulty spreading further in the body.

Cancer relies on nutritional components

Already last year, the results of a study by the University of Glasgow showed that the amino acids serine and glycine can slow down the development of lymphoma and colon cancer. Thus, there is increasing evidence that certain cancers are dependent on specific components of our diet, says study author Professor Greg Hannon of the University of Cambridge. In the future, the physicians hope that they can change the access of the tumor cells to these nutrients by changing the diet or by using drugs. This could significantly improve the treatment results, the experts speculate.

Reduction of asparagine causes formation of fewer metastases

An initial tumor is rarely fatal. However, as the cancer progressively spreads and metastasizes in the body, the disease can quickly become fatal. A cancer cell has to undergo major changes in order to eventually spread throughout the body. The cell has to split off from the main tumor, survive in the bloodstream, and thrive elsewhere in the body. For this process, asparagine seems to be very important. Reducing the availability of asparagine in the body does not directly affect the original tumor, but it reduces it by reducing the number of metastases, explains Professor Hannon.

Further research is needed

Future research will now need to find out if the relationship between breast cancer and asparagine found in mice also applies to humans. If the results of the current study also confirm in humans, this could lead to new therapeutic options. While it may be hard to completely eliminate the amino acid, patients could, for example, receive special drinks that are nutritionally balanced but do not contain asparagine, the researchers say. However, the findings of the investigation should not now lead to patients completely banishing certain food groups from their diet without first talking to their doctors, the experts said. Patients should simply eat a healthy and varied diet.

Medicines used in leukemia could help

Possibly also the medicine with the designation L-asparaginase could be used in the future for the treatment of breast cancer patients. L-asparaginase is currently used to treat acute lymphoblastic leukemia, which also requires asparagine. (As)