As many people start the new year with the goal to exercise more, new research offers encouraging news: even just 10 minutes of intense exercise may help the body fight bowel cancer.
A new study from Newcastle University shows that short bursts of hard exercise can quickly change what happens inside our blood. These changes send powerful signals around the body that can slow down cancer growth and help repair damaged DNA.
Dr Sam Orange, a senior lecturer in clinical exercise physiology, led the research. His team discovered that exercise causes the blood to release small but important molecules. Many of these are linked to reducing inflammation, improving how blood vessels work, and helping the body manage energy better. To understand what this means for cancer, researchers took these exercise-changed blood samples and tested them on bowel cancer cells in the lab. The results were striking.
The activity of more than 1,300 genes inside the cancer cells changed. Some of these genes control how cells grow, how they make energy, and how they repair damaged DNA. The study, published in the International Journal of Cancer, helps explain one way exercise protects against bowel cancer.
It shows that exercise doesn’t just strengthen muscles or improve fitness. It also sends helpful chemical messages through the bloodstream that can influence how cancer cells behave. Dr Orange explained that what makes this discovery exciting is how quickly it happens. “Exercise doesn’t only help healthy cells,” he said. “It sends strong signals through the blood that can directly affect thousands of genes inside cancer cells.” One important finding was that exercise switched on genes that support mitochondria, often called the “power stations” of the cell.
Such activity helps cells use oxygen more efficiently. At the same time, genes linked to fast and uncontrolled cell growth were turned off. This technique could make cancer cells less aggressive. Exercise-changed blood also helped activate a key DNA repair gene called PNKP. This gene plays an important role in fixing damaged DNA, which is important because damaged DNA can lead to cancer growth. The study involved 30 volunteers, both men and women aged between 50 and 78. All were overweight or obese, which is known to increase cancer risk, but otherwise healthy. Each person completed a short but intense cycling workout that lasted about 10 minutes. Blood samples were taken before and after exercise.
Researchers studied 249 different proteins in the blood and found that 13 increased after exercise. One of these was interleukin-6 (IL-6), a protein that helps repair damaged DNA. Dr Orange said the findings show that exercise may create a tougher environment for cancer cells to survive. “Even one short workout can make a difference,” he said. “Just 10 minutes of exercise sends strong signals through the body. Every bit of movement counts.”
Incidence of Bowel Cancer
Bowel cancer is the fourth most common cancer in the UK. Nearly 44,000 people are diagnosed every year, and someone dies from the disease every 30 minutes. Research suggests that regular physical activity can reduce the risk of bowel cancer by around 20%. Exercise doesn’t have to mean long hours at the gym. It can be part of everyday life. Walking, cycling, playing sports, gardening, or even cleaning the house all count as exercise if they keep your body moving. These simple activities can still bring real health benefits. Researchers want to know more about how regular exercise helps the body over time. They plan to study whether these benefits last long term and how exercise works alongside treatments like chemotherapy and radiotherapy. The hope is that future therapies could copy or strengthen the natural benefits that exercise already provides.
