Nutrition, metabolic factors and cancer risk

Excess body weight (adiposity) and physical inactivity are increasingly being recognized as major nutritional risk factors for cancer, and especially for many of those cancer types that have increased incidence rates in affluent, industrialized parts of the world. In this review, an overview is presented of some key biological mechanisms that may provide important metabolic links between nutrition, physical activity and cancer, including insulin resistance and reduced glucose tolerance, increased activation of the growth hormone/IGF-I axis, alterations in sex-steroid synthesis and/or bioavailability, and low-grade chronic inflammation through the effects of adipokines and cytokines.

Key words: nutrition, physical activity, glucose metabolism, insulin, IGF-I, sex hormones, adipokines, inflammation