Induction of Normal Phenotypes in RAS transformed cells by Damnacanthal from Morinda Citrifolia.
February 28th, 2010 at 1:04T. Hiramatsu, M. Imoto, T Koyano, K. Umezawa Cancer Letters 73 (1993) 161-166
In this study, a team of Japanese researchers studied the effect of over 500 extracts from tropical plants on the K-ras-NRK cell (a pre cursor to certain types of cancer). The compound, damnacanthal, found in the Morinda Citrifolia (Noni), was found to be an inhibitor of Ras function. The research: Ras cells were seeded into 96 plates and incubated at 33 degrees centigrade for 24 hours. The Noni plant extract was added and the cell morphology was examined every day for five days.
The Ras function was inhibited by the injected plant extract. This same compound has been found to inhibit the Epstein-Barr virus early-antigen activation. The extract from the Morinda Citrifolia was found to be most effective in inhibiting Ras function among the 500 tested extracts.
Tags: Cancer