Hilakivi-Clarke and her colleagues used rats to evaluate a number of dietary factors in pregnancy when trying to determine effects on health risks that the offspring may inherit. For example, Hilakivi-Clarke showed that the daughters of mothers fed a high-fat diet were at greater risk of breast cancer.
Other researchers have suggested that fiber may reduce breast cancer risk as well. By reducing the levels of estrogen circulating in the mother's body, the possibility of tumors developing is reduced, as estrogen promotes tumor growth. However, evidence of an association between fiber intake and breast cancer reduction in humans has been mixed. Still, Hilakivi-Clarke says the research tells them a lot about the affects of the human diet: "The model we're using should be relatively valid to make assumptions about what's going on in humans."
Hilakivi-Clarke and her fellow researchers looked at the effects of feeding pregnant rats with diets containing six percent fiber from whole wheat flour, oat flour, defatted flax flour and cellulose as control ingredient. The offspring of these female rats were then given a chemical that induces breast cancer.
Of those offspring, the rats whose mothers had been fed the whole wheat diet were less likely to develop breast tumors. According to the research team, those offspring given defatted flax flour were at increased cancer risk. Additionally, the group of pregnant mice that were given oat flour produced no effect on their offspring's breast cancer risk.
Researchers indicated that creating a solid understanding of the way diet influences cancerous risks while a child is still in the womb and after birth may some day allow humans to modify cancer risks by avoiding or eating more of certain food types.
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