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# Caloric restriction may help fight breast cancer
- URL: https://www.foodconsumer.org/caloric_restriction_0728110718/
- Published: 2011-07-28T08:17:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-22T15:44:04.000Z
- Description: In mice, a reduced-calorie diet slowed the growth of mammary tumors and metastases, cut proliferation and angiogenesis, promoted apoptosis, and lowered insulin, IGF-1 and leptin in tumors while raising adiponectin.
- Author: Food Consumer
- Tags: Cancer, Avoiding Illness, Breast Cancer, Caloric Restriction, #vivvo-import

By David Liu, Ph.D.

Reduced intake of calories or caloric restriction may help breast cancer patients to slow the progression and spreading of the disease, a new study in the July 20, 2011 issue of Carcinogenesis suggests.

The study showed a diet with reduced calories (caloric restriction) slowed the growth of mammary tumors and metastases derived from both primary tumors and IV-injected tumor cells, compared to a normal diet.

De Lorenzo MS of New Jersey Medical School, University of Medicine & Dentistry of New Jersey and colleagues, authors of the study, found caloric restriction also reduced proliferation and angiogenesis and promoted apoptosis - programmed cell deaths in tumors.

Caloric restriction was also found to lower the levels of insulin, insulin like growth factor 1 (IGF-1), insulin-like growth factor binding protein 3, and leptin while increasing adiponectin in tumors.

Additionally, caloric restriction resulted in "lower levels of transforming growth factor-beta, lower intratumor deposition of collagen IV and reduced evasiveness", the authors reported.

Caloric restriction has been found in previous studies to prevent breast cancer or protect against the invasiveness of the disease.

**Insulin and related factors and cancer**

Increased levels of insulin, insulin-like growth factor 1 and leptin have been associated with increased risk of breast cancer while adiponectin is linked with decreased risk of the disease.

In the Dec 2003 issue of Integrative Cancer Therapies, D. B. Boyd of Integrative Oncology, LLC in Greenwich, CT reported that elevated levels of insulin and IGF-1 as important growth factors may enhance tumor cell proliferation through the tyrasine kinase growth factor.

Boyd also reported that insulin has been linked with the etiology and prognosis in colon cancer, prostate cancer, pancreatic cancer, and particularly breast cancer. High levels of IGF-1 can also reduce the efficacy of cancer therapies, according to the author.

Insulin based treatment for diabetes can boost cancer risk by 50 percent, Bendix Carstensen from the Steno Diabetes Center in Gentofte, Denmark and colleagues reported.

Their study was published in 2010 on the website of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes.

Researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University conducted their study and also found the link between increased serum insulin and elevated breast cancer risk in postmenopausal women.

Their study was released in 2009 in the International Journal of Cancer.

**Leptin and cancer**

Leptin is involved in the carcinogenesis of breast cancer just like insulin and insulin-like growth factors.

Holly R. Harris and colleagues from Brigham & Women's Hospital found high plasma leptin levels are correlated with elevated risk of breast cancer in premenopausal women. The researchers reported their findings on June 16, 2011 on the website of Cancer Prevention Research.

Increased serum leptin can also increase risk of colorectal cancer, according to a study led by Monica Bartucci of Istituto Superiore di Sanità and colleagues and published online July 5, 2010 on the website of Endocrine-Related Cancer.

**Adiponectin and cancer**

Adiponectin, on the other hand, was inversely associated with risk of breast cancer, according to a study published in the March 2004 issue of the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism.

The study was conducted by Mantzoros C and colleagues from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, MA.