Biomarkers for diet and cancer prevention research:potentials and challenges

<正> As cancer incidence is projected to increase for decades there is a need for effec-tive preventive strategies.Fortunately,evidence continues to mount that alteringdietary habits is an effective and cost-efficient approach for reducing cancer riskand for modifying the biological behavior of tumors.Predictive,validated andsensitive biomarkers,including those that reliably evaluate"intake"or exposureto a specific food or bioactive component,that assess one or more specific bio-logical"effects"that are linked to cancer,and that effectively predict individual"susceptibility"as a function of nutrient-nutrient interactions and genetics,arefundamental to evaluating who will benefit most from dietary interventions.Thesebiomarkers must be readily accessible,easily and reliably assayed,and predictiveof a key process(es) involved in cancer.The response to a food is determined notonly by the effective concentration of the bioactive food component(s) reachingthe target tissue,but also by the amount of the target requiring modification.Thus,this threshold response to foods and their components will vary from indi-vidual to individual.The key to understanding a personalized response is a greaterknowledge of nutrigenomics,proteomics and metabolomics.