摘要:Experimental and epidemiological evidences implicate the involvement of oxygen derived radicals in the pathogenesis of cancer development. Oxygen derived radicals are able to cause damage to membranes, mitochondria and macromolecules including proteins, lipids and DNA. Accumulation of DNA damages has been suggested to contribute to carcinogenesis. It would, therefore, be advantageous to pinpoint the effects of oxygen derived radicals in cancer development. We investigated superoxide dismutase (SOD) and Catalase (CAT) activities in the whole blood of 50 breast cancer (BC) patients and 50 healthy and age matched women. The rate of SOD and CAT activities in BC patients was significantly lower (P