According to scientists, broccoli contains a chemical called sulphoraphane, which activates cancer-fighting enzymes inside cells.  Researchers say the richest source of sulphoraphane is contained in sprouts.

In a demonstration of the plant’s anti-cancer properties, investigators smeared broccoli sprout extract on the skin of six volunteers for three days, and then exposed them to high doses of ultraviolet radiation, which is the leading cause of skin cancer.

They found there was an average 37 percent less redness and sunburn in the patches covered by broccoli extract.  Redness and sunburn are an indication of skin damage that could lead to cancer.

The results of the study are published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Paul Talalay is a Johns Hopkins University molecular pharmacologist and the author of the study.  Talalay says sunscreen conferred no protection against the UV rays, but he says that does not mean people should stop using it.

“We want to avoid under all circumstances people doing weird things like making broccoli sprout soup and applying to their skin and thinking that they will be protected against the sun,” he said.  “They will have not have any protection whatsoever, because it’s a totally different mechanism and one cannot possibly substitute for the other.”

Applied as a thick cream, sunscreen protects the skin by deflecting the sun’s harmful rays.  But it must be constantly reapplied to remain effective.

In contrast, Talalay says, a compound made of broccoli sprouts works by penetrating skin cells and stimulating their natural cancer-fighting mechanism.

Observers call the research promising, but say more studies are needed because the results varied considerably among participants, ranging from a low of eight percent to a high of 78 percent protection against sunburn.  Talalay disagrees.

“Everybody knows you go to the beach and you get fried and I go to the beach and nothing happens to me,” he added.  “And we are in the same place.  So, the same experiment if done in a large number of individuals would be much more complex.  But I believe that the evidence certainly from animal studies is that we would get absolutely the same result.”

Talalay believes if it works in the skin, a sulphoraphane extract from broccoli sprouts is very likely to act as a hedge against cancer in other organs.

Meanwhile, researchers say there are a number of challenges in making a sun cream from broccoli sprouts, not the least of which is figuring out how to get rid of the green tint.

In a new study published online Monday in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, researchers report that the rate of double mastectomy in women with single-breast cancer rose 150 percent in six years – even though the aggressive treatment doesn’t necessarily improve survival rates.

The researchers used a national cancer-treatment database to study the treatment decisions of more than 150,000 women who were diagnosed with cancer in a single breast from 1998 to 2003. White women, younger women and women whose cancer originated in their milk glands, increasing risk of occurrence in the other breast, were more likely to choose a double mastectomy, the researchers found.

“It’s a very vulnerable time for these patients. In a very short period of time they have to decide how to treat their breast cancer. Under the stress of the situation they will have both breasts removed because it seems logical at the time,” said lead author Dr. Todd Tuttle, chief of surgical oncology at the University of Minnesota.

The actual number of women choosing double mastectomy remains relatively small: Of all women undergoing mastectomies of any kind in the study, 4.2 percent chose double mastectomy in 1998, rising to 11 percent in 2003. A total of 4,969 women in the study received a double mastectomy.

The trend is troubling, Tuttle said. Cancer is more likely to spread to other parts of the body than it is to develop in the second breast. Women often make the irreversible decision too quickly, when they are under duress, he said.

“I often tell patients to wait, saying, ‘Let’s treat the cancer we know about and deal with that,’ ” Tuttle said.

One in every eight women will develop invasive breast cancer at some time in their lives, according to the American Cancer Society. In 2004, the most recent year for which federal data is available, nearly 187,000 women in the United States were diagnosed with breast cancer and nearly 50,000 women died.

Typically discovered through mammography or direct examination, breast cancer is treated with medication, chemotherapy, radiation, and surgeries ranging from lumpectomy, in which a part of the breast is removed, to mastectomy, in which the entire breast is removed and in many cases reconstructed with implants or tissue from other parts of the body.

Doctors and patients’ advocates urged women considering the procedure to go for counseling and take their time before making a decision, noting that other risk-reducing options were available.

Lupeol, a compound in fruits like mangoes, grapes and strawberries, appears to be effective in killing and curbing the spread of cancer cells in the head and neck, a study in the University of Hong Kong has found.

The study, conducted by the university’s Faculty of Medicine, revealed that lupeol, a compound rich in fruits, selectively targeted and killed cancer cells. Using a mouse animal model, lupeol dramatically decreased tumor volume and suppressed local metastasis while bearing minimal effect on surrounding tissue and other vital organs like liver and kidney.

“It can suppress the movement of cancer cells and suppress their growth and it is found to be even more effective than conventional drugs (eg. cisplatin),” said Anthony Yuen, a professor at the University of Hong Kong’s surgery department.
“It’s even more effective if we combine it with chemotherapy drugs, and has very little side effects,” he said.

Interestingly, lupeol was found to be more effective and more potent than conventionally used chemotherapeutic drug, cisplatin, by approximately three-fold in terms of tumor volume and degree of metastasis suppression.

Besides, when lupeol was used in combination with cisplatin, the anti-tumor activity of the chemotherapeutic drug could be enhanced by 40-fold.

The above research result was published in the international scientific journal Cancer Research in September, 2007.

Head and neck cancer includes cancers of the nose, oral cavity, salivary gland, etc. In the year 2004, 2,087 new cases were diagnosed in Hong Kong, with the number of new cases increasing steadily every year.

Human papilloma virus infection, alcohol and tobacco consumption and low fruits and vegetables intake all contribute to the increased risk of head and neck cancer development.

The university was in the hope that the findings will also show people that only a slight change in their everyday meal or a small change in their choice of food intake may have an astounding impact on cancer prevention and therapy.

“Conventional drugs made the mice a lot thinner, but lupeol mice retained their bulk.” Emaciation is usually viewed as a bad sign in the fight against cancer.

Yuen hopes lupeol can be applied to other cancers that are similarly dependent on the NFkB protein to grow and spread.

“It may be possible to use (lupeol) in other cancers because it is able to suppress the NFkB protien, which is activated in many cancers like prostate cancer, breast cancer, liver cancer,” Yuen said.

Death rates from cancer are dropping more quickly across the United States, offering what an expert called a “glimmer of hope” against a leading killer.

According to a new report, cancer death rates fell by 2.1 percent each year from 2002 through 2004, almost double the 1.1 percent annual decline recorded between 1993 and 2003.

Most of the top 15 cancers in both men and women experienced declines in death rates. Notably, men saw declines in death rates for lung, prostate and colorectal cancers, while women saw declines in colorectal and breast cancer. In addition, the increase in death rates from lung cancer among women slowed considerably.

“That’s a very encouraging finding. It’s the key indicator of progress in cancer,” said Dr. David Espey, a cancer epidemiologist from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta who was assigned to the Indian Health Service Division of Epidemiology and Disease Control, in Albuquerque, N.M.

The acceleration in decline of cancer deaths is “a good news story,” added Dr. Corey J. Langer, director of thoracic and head and neck medical oncology at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia. “It’s the first glimmer of hope in a long time,” he said.

The report, which appears annually, is a joint effort from the American Cancer Society, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. National Cancer Institute, and the North American Association of Central Cancer Registries.

Obesity is the single strongest risk factor for colon cancer in women, U.S. researchers reported on Monday.

They found that women with precancerous polyps in the colon were more likely to be obese than women without these lesions. And obesity more strongly predicted who would have these growths than smoking or having a family history of colon cancer.

“Of all the risk factors like age, family history, smoking, the most potent risk factor was being obese,” Dr. Joseph Anderson of Stony Brook University in New York, who led the study, said in a telephone interview.

“One in five lesions may be attributable to obesity.”

Colorectal cancer is the third-leading cause of cancer death in the United States. It will affect 153,000 Americans in 2007, according to the American Cancer Society, and will kill 52,000.

Family history, smoking and diet are all linked with colorectal cancer but Anderson said experts are still struggling to identify the causes that underlie most cases.

Doctors can use colonoscopy, in which a tiny camera is threaded up into the colon, to not only detect precancerous polyps but to remove them, thus often preventing cancer.

Anderson and colleagues examined the records of 1,252 women who underwent colonoscopy, classifying patients by age, smoking history, family history of colorectal cancer, and body mass index or BMI. Obesity was defined as having a BMI of 30 or higher.

Then they looked to see who had the most polyps, and who was more likely to have them at all.

“BMI was a huge risk factor. And it’s a risk factor that’s increasing,” Anderson said.

BMI was not linked to the risk of colon cancer for men, Anderson and colleagues found.

“We need to counsel people on things like losing weight and staying thin,” said Anderson, who presented his findings to a meeting in Philadelphia of the American College of Gastroenterology.

“Given the increasing number of obese patients in the United States, identifying them as high risk may have important screening implications,” he added.

Why obesity might be linked with colon cancer is unclear, said Anderson.

“Probably the leading factors are going to be insulin and insulin-like growth factor,” he said. People who have more visceral fat, the fat around the internal organs that is associated with the worst effects of being overweight, also have higher levels of insulin and insulin-like growth factor.

A new study has shown that magnetic resonance imaging scans (MRIs) were more effective at detecting early stages of breast cancer than traditional mammograms.

The research, published in the Lancet medical journal, found that 92 per cent of cases of early breast cancer were detected by the MRI scan, whereas only 56 per cent of cases were detected by the mammogram.

At a national breast centre in Germany, the researchers analysed MRIs carried out for women who were at an increased risk of breast cancer, had an abnormal mammogram, or had a normal mammogram but were particularly concerned about breast cancer.

Cancer Research UK’s professor of screening Stephen Duffy welcomed the research: “The results are interesting and add weight to the findings of a UK study published in 2005 which found MRI to be more sensitive than mammography to invasive cancers in women at high genetic risk.”

However, he called for further studies to be conducted before conclusive results could be drawn: “While this study provides further evidence of the benefit of MRI examinations in high-risk women, none of these studies has concluded that MRI should replace mammography. The consensus is that they should be used in tandem for high-risk women.”

In a survey of 1,600 women only 2.5% cited human papillomavirus as a risk factor for cervical cancer.

Researchers said the results, published in the British Journal of Cancer, were “striking” considering recent publicity over the development of a HPV vaccine.

Experts said the public needed to be better informed before widespread vaccination was introduced.

There are over 100 different types of HPV and they are the most common sexually transmitted disease.

Around 80% of sexually active women can expect to have an HPV infection at some point in their lives.

Two vaccines have been developed – Gardasil and Cervarix – which have been shown to be very effective against the strains most commonly linked with cervical cancer.

In June, government advisors recommended girls aged between 12 and 13 in the UK should be vaccinated against the HPV.

It has also been suggested that HPV testing should play a part in cervical screening.

The disease kills 1,120 women in the UK every year.

New research suggests that a nutrient in red meat, poultry and dairy products may contribute to the development of intestinal polyps, which can lead to colon cancer.

The study, which involved women only, was preliminary, and no one is yet suggesting a change in diet as a result.

However, the research into the nutrient, called choline, could ultimately lead to new dietary recommendations, said Eunyoung Cho, an epidemiologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

“There may be some impact,” Cho said. “But this is one study, and it’s hard to make any conclusion based on this study.”

The role played by choline, a nutrient required by the body, has been unclear. Some researchers had thought it might provide protection against colon cancer, which kills an estimated 52,000 people in the United States each year, according to the American Cancer Society. The disease is the second biggest cancer killer in the United States after lung cancer.

In the new study, Cho and colleagues looked at nurses enrolled in a large study. They found more than 39,000 women who were free of colon cancer and then underwent at least one endoscopic examination between 1984 and 2002. Polyps — benign growths that can lead to colon cancer — were found in more than 2,400 of the women.

Women who ate the most choline in their food were 1.45 times more likely to have polyps, the team reported in the Aug. 7 online issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

Having more polyps doesn’t necessarily mean more cancer, and future research will explore whether those who ate the most choline actually developed tumors, Cho said. Studies also need to look into the impact of choline on men.

Why might choline contribute to polyps, and possibly colon cancer, in the first place? The nutrient is a major component of the membranes of cells, Cho said, “and the tumor cell may need choline.”

Currently, health officials recommend that people prevent colon cancer by eating a lot of fiber along with fruits and vegetables. Red meat, meanwhile, is thought to increase risk.

That dietary advice isn’t likely to change even if choline turns out to be a possible villain, said Regina Ziegler, a senior investigator with the National Cancer Institute, who co-wrote a commentary accompanying the new study. “What they’re finding is consistent” with the recommendations, she said.

As for now, “people shouldn’t run out and start either taking more choline or less choline,” she said.

Those who drink one or two cups of tea daily may have a lower risk of developing two types of skin cancer by 20 to 30 percent. In a study conducted on nearly 2,200 adults, researchers found that tea drinkers had a lower risk of developing squamous cell and basal cell carcinoma, the two most common forms of skin cancer.

The findings were published in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology.

Tea drinking did not show any effect on the worst skin cancer, melanoma. Still, the findings support the theory that tea antioxidants may limit the damage UV radiation inflicts on the skin, according to the study authors, led by Dr. Judy R. Rees of Dartmouth Medical School in Lebanon, New Hampshire.

The researchers do warn that it is not okay to bake in the sun and then have a cup of tea afterwards.

The study did not mention what specific types of teas might be more beneficial than others.

The American Cancer Society said it was looking for half a million volunteers willing to let researchers watch them for the next 20 years to see if they get cancer.

The aim is to match similar big studies in Europe and Asia that are looking on a large scale for the environmental and lifestyle factors that cause cancer, the second-leading cause of death in the United States after heart disease.

“This type of study involves hundreds of thousands of people, with diverse backgrounds, followed for many years, with collection of biological specimens and assessments of dietary, lifestyle and environmental exposures,” Eugenia Calle, managing director of analytic epidemiology at the American Cancer Society, said in a statement.

“It also requires active follow-up to discover if and when study participants develop cancer.”

The group will recruit men and women between the ages of 30 and 65 who have never been diagnosed with cancer. They will give blood to be tested and answer questionnaires at various times over the next 20 years.

Similar big studies have confirmed the link between cigarette smoking and lung cancer, shown that obesity increases the risk of several cancers, and linked aspirin use to a lower death rate from colon cancer.

They have also found evidence that defied conventional wisdom, such as the Women’s Health Initiative study that found hormone replacement therapy actually raises the risk of breast cancer, stroke and heart attack.