Do functional Selenoprotein SNPs predict risk of prostate cancer?
Dr Margaret Rayman & Dr Fiona Green, School of Biomedical and Life Sciences, University of Surrey

There is now a considerable body of evidence to suggest that the essential nutrient, selenium, has the potential to reduce the incidence of and mortality from prostate cancer. Extensive experimental evidence indicates that selenium supplementation reduces the incidence of cancer in animals, while geographic studies have shown a consistent trend for populations with low selenium intakes to have a higher cancer mortality rate. A significantly lower risk of various malignancies, but particularly of prostate cancer, has been shown for individuals with higher selenium status in prospective studies.

Dr Margaret Raymen, who is researching Selenoprotein SNPs

There are several SNPs (single nucleotide polymorphisms) that may be relevant to prostate cancer, but to date no attempt has been made to asses their contribution to prostate cancer per se.

We aim to address this by

• Comparing allele frequencies in a unique sample set of 2000 prostate cancer cases and 1200 cancer-free male controls over 50 years of age.
• Measuring selenium levels (in stored plasma samples) in approximately 50 cases and 50 controls to confirm that baseline selenium status is indeed low in this group.

Project commenced
June 2004

Length of project
2 years

Amount Supported
£27,077