Abstract
Breast cancer has well documented risk factors. Obesity and changes in lipid metabolism are important parts of them, especially in postmenopausal women.
There is a change in the metabolism of cancer cells. Higher de novo synthesis of fatty acids (FA) predominates.
This process leads to an increased amount of monounsaturated fatty acids (MUFA) in membranes of cancer cells with other consequences like change of membrane fluidity and change of membrane's rafts. It influences signalling pathways resulting in protumorogenic processes.
There are also many epidemiologic studies on influence of dietary interventions using polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) n-3 and n-6 on a risk of development of breast cancer. Polyunsaturated fatty acids n-3 modulate processes reducing breast cancer cell growth.
Polyunsaturated n-6, saturated and monounsaturated FA have rather opposite effects on cancer growth and development. Our study on patients with breast cancer has shown typical results in that there is an increase of saturated fatty acids and a decrease of PUFA n-3 in patients with breast cancer.
This finding support a hypothesis about the significance of an increased dietary intake of PUFA n-3 for the prevention of breast cancer development.