Apoptosis In An Herbal Way!

By Author: nick smmith
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Those of us who keep an eye on these things have known for many years that several compounds found in the ginger rhizome have anti-cancer activity. Phytonutrients such as zingerone, ginger, curcumin and paradol have strong anti-mutagenic activity. Not only do they protect against DNA damage and the inflammation that underlies most types of cancer, but they also have the ability to kill existing cancer cells or the program of apoptosis is done.

How Apoptosis is programmed?

Apoptosis is essential to normal development and maintenance of the organism. Cells have a finite life span, and there is a constant program of cellular replacement and removal which is very finely controlled. Apoptosis also deals with cells considered a threat to the organism, such as those infected by viruses, those which have fulfilled an immune system function and those with DNA mutations or which identify themselves as cancer cells. Apoptosis is an important part of cancer research, since resistance to programmed cell death is known to be a key element in the survival of tumor cells. Malignancies develop in response to delayed or inhibited ...
... apoptosis. Cells will then live longer, and often grow faster, than normal cells, allowing tumors to develop. This is often due to defects in the cell signaling pathways, which can also make tumor cells more resistant to chemotherapy drugs. Thus a large amount of research is done in overcoming resistance to apoptosis, or in stimulating apoptotic pathways to encourage programmed cell death of cancer cells. The caspases belong to the cysteine protease enzyme family, and play an essential role in apoptosis. They form three groups: initiator, effector and cytokine processor caspases, which when activated initiate a complex enzyme cascade. Disruption of this mechanism is a key factor in many cancers.

The wonder Herb!

The researchers have found that ginger is such a compound which has the ability to induce leukemia cells to commit suicide - or as the scientists like to call it - apoptosis. Spices such as ginger we have allies that can actually induce apoptosis in several cancer cell lines. By means of several mechanisms these compounds have the ability to interfere with cancer at both DNA and cellular level thereby inducing apoptosis in a number of different malignancies. Ginger based drugs now joins this elite group of cancer fighting compounds as this current laboratory-based research shows that it has the ability to induce apoptosis in human leukemia cells.It will be a long time before anyone will be using shogaol in clinical trials to see if it can successfully treat existing malignancies such as leukemia. However this research does reiterate what many of us have been saying for a long time - that common, culinary herbs and spices contain compounds that have the ability to protect us against cancer and several other diseases. The evidence is there and to benefit from it we need to make a commitment to increase our daily intake of beneficial culinary herbs and spices such as ginger.

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