sparkle7
Frequent Contributor (5K+ posts)
Member # 10397
posted
Ancient Chinese Salad Plant Yields Cancer-Killing Compound
Researchers have used a traditional Chinese medicine to create a compound that is more than 1,200 times more specific in killing certain kinds of cancer cells than currently available drugs.
The new compound is derived from artemisinin, which is made from the sweet wormwood plant (Artemisia annua L), an herb that has been used in Chinese medicine for at least 2,000 years, and is eaten in salads in some Asian countries.
The scientists attached a chemical homing device to artemisinin that targets the drug selectively to cancer cells, sparing healthy cells. "The compound is like a special agent planting a bomb inside the cell," said chemistry professor Tomikazu Sasaki, who worked on developing the compound.
The compound Sasaki and his colleagues developed kills about 12,000 cancer cells for every healthy cell.
Sources: Science Daily October 15, 2008 Cancer Letters October 5, 2008
Posts: 7772 | From Northeast, again... | Registered: Oct 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Sparkle , I have read multiple articles that scientifically substantiate this fact and they are easy to find . I am amazed how toxic it is for many different cancer cells .
If people google "Artemisia " and " cancer " the articles can be found , some that are written over a layperson's head . others are easier to comprehend .
It makes me think I am doing something good while I take this herb .
treepatrol
Honored Contributor (10K+ posts)
Member # 4117
posted
Minocin doxy tetra stop cancers
-------------------- Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Remember Iam not a Doctor Just someone struggling like you with Tick Borne Diseases.
Keebler
Honored Contributor (25K+ posts)
Member # 12673
posted
-
Clint asked: "Does Artemisinin also do a good job of hitting Lyme as well?"
--
Individual lyme researchers may have written about this and it would be nice to see what they say about the question.
From just a basic search at PubMed (and this is just a place to begin), I found no abstracts relating to lyme or borrelia. However, as lyme is a gram-negative bacteria, some stuff came up from that angle.
From one study in 2004, Artemisinin had a 90% minimum inhibitory concentration for a similar spirochetal infection, Leptospirosis.
This is encouraging in how it may help work, along WITH other anti-lyme measures. Note: "inhibitory" is not the same as a total clobber. It's a helper.
The researchers go on to say:
"The only agents identified with the potential to treat both infections other than doxycycline (MIC(90) = 1.56 microg/mL) were azithromycin (MIC(90) = 0.002 microg/mL) and clindamycin (MIC(90) = 0.2 microg/mL)."
While the wording is a bit confusing for the conclusion, I interpret this saying artemisinin, alone, is not enough to treat leptospirosis completly but that it might be of help.
Again, this was just a basic search. It's a good question.
Susceptibility of Leptospira serovars to antimalarial agents. - - Murray CK, Ellis MW, Hospenthal DR.
Infectious Disease Service, Department of Medicine, Brooke Army Medical Center, 3851 Roger Brooke Drive, Fort Sam Houston, TX 78234, USA.
Leptospirosis has recently been described to cause concomitant infection with malaria. Only doxycycline has proven to have chemoprophylactic and therapeutic efficacy for both malaria and leptospirosis.
To assess whether other traditional antimalarial agents have antileptospiral activity, we performed broth microdilution susceptibility testing of 16 Leptospira serovars (6 species/14 serogroups) to various agents.
Artemisinin, atovaquone, chloroquine, mefloquine, primaquine, proguanil, pyrimethamine, sulfadoxine, quinine, quinidine, and combinations of atovaquone/proguanil and pyrimethamine/sulfadoxine (all)
all had a 90% minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC(90)) > 25 microg/mL (the upper limit of testing).
The only agents identified with the potential to treat both infections other than doxycycline (MIC(90) = 1.56 microg/mL) were azithromycin (MIC(90) = 0.002 microg/mL) and clindamycin (MIC(90) = 0.2 microg/mL).
Leptospirosis (also known as Weil's disease, canicola fever, canefield fever, nanukayami fever, 7-day fever and many more[1])
is a bacterial zoonotic disease caused by spirochaetes of the genus Leptospira that affects humans and a wide range of animals, including mammals, birds, amphibians, and reptiles . . . .
The Lyme Disease Network is a non-profit organization funded by individual donations. If you would like to support the Network and the LymeNet system of Web services, please send your donations to:
The
Lyme Disease Network of New Jersey 907 Pebble Creek Court,
Pennington,
NJ08534USA http://www.lymenet.org/
UBBFriend: Email this page to someone!
Printer-friendly view of this topic