Pixabay A recent study found that 50% of the colon tumors tested showed the presence of the Fna C2 subtype of F. nucleatum. Photo by Konstantin Kolosov
A germ commonly found in the human mouth can travel to colon tumors and appears to speed their growth, new research shows. The finding might lead to new insights into fighting colon cancer, which kills more than 52,000 Americans each year, according to the American Cancer Society. Advertisement
Researchers at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle looked at levels of a particular oral bacterium, Fusobacterium nucleatum, in colon tumor tissues taken from 200 colon cancer patients.
The microbe has several subtypes, but only one, dubbed Fna C2, appeared to be linked to tumor and not healthy tissue, they reported Wednesday in Nature. The Fna C2 subtype also appeared more often in stool samples collected from colon cancer patients compared to healthy folks.
Oral bacteria may speed growth of colon cancers
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