Whether we realize it at the time or not, everything we eat has some sort of effect on our health - positive or negative, but never neutral.
Before synthetic modern medicines (and some of them work wonders), millenniums of people stayed in great health by the foods and medicines they derived from nature.
Turmeric has anticancer chemical. Photo by sallybernstein.com.
Well taking some lessons from the past, many researchers in highly respected institutions of medical science are starting to re-examine the properties of the foods and spices we get from nature. They’re finding some promising chemical compounds with properties capable of both contributing to the prevention and fighting of many serious conditions and diseases, such as cancer.
Most recently, a study was published in the British Journal of Cancer, found that certain molecules found in a curry spice have been shown to kill oesophageal (also spelled as esophageal) cancer cells in laboratory tests.
Scientists at the Cork Cancer Research Center, in Ireland, treated oesophageal cancer cells with curcumin, which is a chemical found in the curry spice turmeric. They found that the curcumin started to kill cancer cells within 24 hours.
“Scientists have known for a long time that natural compounds have the potential to treat faulty cells that have become cancerous. These exciting results suggest that scientist could develop curcumin as a potential anticancer drug to treat oesophageal cancer,” said Dr. Sharon McKenna, a lead author of the study at Cork.
“The incidence of oesophageal cancer have gone up by more than a half since the ‘70s, particularly in the Western world and this is thought to be linked to rising rates of obesity, alcohol intake, and reflux disease. The development of natural compounds as chemopreventative (stopping cells from becoming malignant) agents is also a very promising area of research,” McKenna added.
In England, researchers at the University of Leicester have been looking at foods that many affect cancer risk since 2000.
Professors Will Steward and Andy Gescher at the university’s department of cancer studies and molecular medicine have been leading research where “findings indicate that food-derived substances not only appear to be effective on precancerous cells, but also on cancerous cells. However, while they are safe to use and do not have the potential side effects of traditional anticancer drugs, it has still to be established that they work effectively for humans.”
Steward and Gescher have been leading research into resveratrol (from red berries and red wine), tricin (from brown rice), and polyphenols from tea.
“The compounds seem to work through a wide variety of mechanisms, including altering signals which reduce blood vessel formation, and by reducing DNA changes which can cause the cells to become malignant. If the research is successful, we could prevent a huge amount of distress caused to patients and families, not just from the cancer itself, but also from the effects of treatment,” said Steward.
Researchers at Leicester are also investigating the following foods for their medicinal properties:
- Bilberries- to commercially produce the substance mirtoselect as a possible drug to stop colorectal and liver cancer from developing in apparently healthy people, and to prevent it from recurring in patients who have been successfully treated.
- Tea- to investigate tea polyphenols as prostate cancer preventative agents. In laboratory tests, both green and black tea polyphenols have been shown to slow the growth of human prostate cancer cells.
- Red wine- to test the hypothesis that resveratrol (a polyphenol found in red wine and many fruits), when taken in large doses, generates agent levels in the human body, which have been shown to engage cancer chemopreventative mechanisms in experiments in cells in test tubes.
- Rice Bran- to expand on 2007 laboratory research that revealed that rice bran could reduce the risk of intestinal cancer.
- Greens- to investigate a molecule in vegetables such as broccoli and cabbage (Indole-3-carbinol) that might be able to inhibit the growth of breast cancer cells and could be used in conjunction with drugs to help fight cancer.
Bilberries. Photo by dailymail.co.uk.
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