Curcumin in turmeric may curb breast cancer spread
Published: June 12, 2005
Turmeric powder, which is commonly used in Indian cooking, contains a chemical called Curcumin, which may help curb breast cancer from spreading, a new research has revealed.
The study by Texas University researchers involved mice instead of human beings, and therefore, the researchers are not suggesting people to use curcumin for cancer-related reasons.
“Curcumin could be of tremendous value if it’s shown to be effective in humans, but we’re a long way from being able to make any recommendations yet,” WebMd quoted Dr. Bharat Aggarwal as saying.
Turmeric, which has also been a traditional medicine in India for quite a long time, is now also getting attention from the West. And Curcumin, an antioxidant that gives turmeric its yellow color, is on the National Cancer Society’s list of compounds that have shown some evidence of cancer prevention.
During the course of study, the researchers divided the mice into four treatment groups - curcumin alone, the breast cancer drug Taxol alone, curcumin and Taxol, and no treatment. After studying them for five weeks, they found that cancer had spread to the lungs of mice in all groups, but the curcumin groups fared best.
In the curcumin-plus-Taxol less than 25 percent of the mice had cancer that spread to the lungs, whereas in curcumin, Taxol and no treatment group it was 50, 70 and 95 percent respectively.
The results were unexpected, so the researchers repeated the test, and let the cancers grow a little bit bigger before removing them. After five weeks, half of the mice in the curcumin and curcumin-plus-Taxol groups had cancer in their lungs.
“Curcumin acts against transcription factors, which are like a master switch. Transcription factors regulate all the genes needed for tumors to form. When we turn them off, we shut down some genes that are involved in the growth and invasion of cancer cells,” Aggarwal said.
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