Not only is sugar the primary source of excess calories, but the latest research also shows that cancer cells lap up high-fructose corn syrup, adding yet another reason to avoid it.

A couple of years ago, researchers from the University of California-Los Angeles found that pancreatic tumor cells use fructose to divide and reproduce, debunking earlier assumptions that all sugars were the same.

Tumor cells that were fed glucose and fructose used those sugars in two different ways, the research team said.

‘Major significance for cancer patients’

Their findings, which were published in the journal Cancer Research, could help explain earlier studies that have linked ingestion of fructose with pancreatic cancer, one of the deadliest forms of the disease.

“These findings show that cancer cells can readily metabolize fructose to increase proliferation,” Dr. Anthony Heaney of UCLA’s Jonsson Cancer Center and colleagues wrote in 2010.

“They have major significance for cancer patients given dietary refined fructose consumption, and indicate that efforts to reduce refined fructose intake or inhibit fructose-mediated actions may disrupt cancer growth,” he said.

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