Daffodil Antidote to Cure Cancer – Latest Development in Cancer Research
Flower power to shield us all from cancer? Likely- a new finding describes the anti-cancer effects of a natural alkaloid extracted from Daffodils.
Researchers at the Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB) in Belgium led by Denis Lafontaine extracted an alkaloid, haemanthamine, which is capable of binding to ribosomes, the nanomachines that cancer relies on to synthesize proteins.
Ribosomes are a complicated of molecules present in all cells, known as nanomachines, they synthesize the entire proteins our cells want. Since tumors are necessarily simply cells which might be rising out of keep watch over, they may be able to hijack ribosomes to ramp up protein manufacturing.
But this mechanism may also be most cancers’s weak point. After extracting haemanthamine from daffodils, the ULB researchers discovered that the compound attacked most cancers in numerous tactics without delay. First, it stopped ribosomes from generating proteins, which bogged down the expansion of the tumor.
Further up the road, it even stopped ribosomes themselves from being produced. Not best does that still gradual the most cancers’s expansion, however it triggers a tension reaction in an anti-tumor surveillance pathway. A protein referred to as p53, which
in most cases is frequently degrading away in wholesome cells, is stabilized, inflicting a fast mobile dying.
This study provides for the first time a molecular explanation to the anti-tumoral activity of Daffodils used for centuries in folk medicine. In a near future, the team in collaboration with Veronique Mathieu (Faculty of Pharmacy- ULB), will test the effect on ribosome biogenesis and function of four Amaryllidaceae alkaloids, representative of the chemical diversity of these molecules.
Their goal will be to identify rapidly the most promising chemical backbone to be further developed as a lead compound in cancer therapeutics.
