Cauliflower is recommended for breast cancer

Like broccoli, cabbage, and brussels sprouts, cauliflower is a brassica vegetable. While cauliflower contains fewer vitamins and minerals than most other brassica vegetables, it contains numerous substances with suspected or demonstrated cancer fighting properties, including iberin, sinigrin, choline, indole-3-carbinol (I3C), 3,3'-diindolylmethane (DIM), sulforaphane, and several other glucosinolates. Cauliflower or its components have been shown to inhibit urinary bladder, small intestine, colorectal and liver carcinogenesis, and reduce the risk of occurrence of gallbladder, prostate, lung, urothelial, and cervical cancer.

Breast cancer-related effects of eating cauliflower

Cauliflower and its component molecules have been found to be promote apoptosis, suppress cell cycle progression and inhibit angiogenesis of human breast cancer cells. Furthermore, cauliflower can protect against cell DNA damage. Consumption of brassica vegetables has been shown to reduce the estrogen metabolite 16alpha-hydroxyestrone, which is a breast cancer promoter, and to be marginally inversely associated with breast cancer risk in a population of premenopausal women. Cauliflower components I3C and sulforaphane have both been shown increase the anti-cancer effects of the chemotherapy drug Taxol (paclitaxel).

Additional comments

We recommend consuming the cancer-fighting components of cauliflower and other brassica vegetables as food and against consuming them as "broccoli pills" that have been enhanced to boost the proportion of the presumed key anti-cancer chemicals in these vegetables. There is some evidence that concentrated cruciferous vegetable extracts can act as estrogen agonists and promote breast cancer cell proliferation. Also, the anticancer properties of cauliflower are likely to be the result of synergistic interaction of its various chemical components - isolated components have successfully inhibited proliferation in the laboratory, but their efficacy and safety in humans needs to be evaluated in large scale clinical trials.

Cruciferous vegetables contain thioglucoside compounds that can interfere with the formation of thyroid hormone.

Tags: DIM, I3C, Indole-3-carbinol, Taxol, cauliflower, cervicalCancer, chemotherapy, estrone, isothiocyanates, paclitaxel, sulforaphane

Selected breast cancer studies
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Natural isothiocyanates: Genotoxic potential versus chemoprevention Sulforaphane inhibits the growth of KPL-1 human breast cancer cells in vitro and suppresses the growth and metastasis of orthotopically transplanted KPL-1 cells in female athymic mice Fruit and Vegetable Intake in Relation to Risk of Breast Cancer in the Black Womens Health Study Glucoraphanin hydrolysis by microbiota in the rat cecum results in sulforaphane absorption Regulation of estrogen receptor α expression in human breast cancer cells by sulforaphane Influence of Cooking Methods on Antioxidant Activity of Vegetables Indole-3-carbinol inhibits MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cell motility and induces stress fibers and focal adhesion formation by activation of Rho kinase activity The effect of 3,3’-diindolylmethane (DIM) on plasma cytokine levels in healthy human subjects Steam cooking significantly improves in vitro bile acid binding of beets, eggplant, asparagus, carrots, green beans, and cauliflower Preclinical and clinical evaluation of sulforaphane for chemoprevention in the breast