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High-Sugar Diet Linked to Lung Cancer, Expanding Our Understanding of Diet’s Impact

Discover how high-sugar diets contribute to more aggressive lung tumor growth — and how this knowledge could shape future cancer treatments.

Jenny Lehmann
ByJenny Lehmann
Image Credit: Halfpoint/Shutterstock

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Many lifestyle factors are already known to influence cancer development, prompting people to modify their habits. Well-established connections include smoking as a cause of lung cancer, excessive alcohol consumption leading to liver cancer, and poor dietary choices increasing the risk of stomach, pancreatic, and colorectal cancers.

A less conventional link between an unhealthy diet and lung cancer was recently identified by researchers at the University of Florida Health, in collaboration with the University of Kentucky's Markey Cancer Center and the UF Health Cancer Center. For the first time, they categorized lung cancer as a diet-related disease. Their findings, published in Nature Metabolism, highlight the influence of diet on health and may encourage more people to adopt healthier eating habits.

Unfortunately, many crave-worthy foods contain ingredients linked to increased cancer risk, including red meats, alcohol, saturated fats, ultra-processed foods, and sugary drinks.

One major factor is sugar. When consumed in excess, ...

  • Jenny Lehmann

    Jenny Lehmann

    Jenny Lehmann is an assistant editor at Discover Magazine who writes articles on microbiology, psychology, neurology, and zoology, and oversees the Piece of Mind column of the print issue.

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