Investigation of circulating metabolites associated with breast cancer risk by untargeted metabolomics: a case–control study nested within the French E3N cohort

Background Perturbations in circulating metabolites prior to a breast cancer diagnosis are not well characterised. We aimed to gain more detailed knowledge to help understand and prevent the disease. Methods Baseline plasma samples from 791 breast cancer cases and 791 matched controls from the E3N (EPIC-France) cohort were profiled by nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR)-based untargeted metabolomics. Partial least-squares discriminant analysis...