Kliemann N, Murphy N, Viallon V, et al. - Researchers examined how the estimated basal metabolic rate (BMR) is associated with incidence of 13 obesity-related cancers in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition. In this study, they analyzed a total of 141,295 men and 317,613 women, with a mean follow-up of 14 years. Overall, they identified a greater risk for most cancers that have been linked with obesity in correlation with higher BMR. However, normal-weight male participants exhibited elevated risks of esophageal adenocarcinoma, and distal colon cancer, and normal-weight female participants exhibited elevated risks of the proximal colon, pancreatic, thyroid, postmenopausal breast, and endometrial cancers both in correlation with higher BMR. Results thereby suggest the possible value of higher BMR as an indicator of a metabolic phenotype linked with risk of certain cancer types, and as a relevant predictor of cancer risk independent of body fatness.