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Reviewed By: Louise Chang,
SOURCES: 2009 WebMD Medical Reference from Medstar Television. Tomikazu Sasaki, PhD, Chemistry Professor/Researcher, University of Washington, Seattle. Evan Y. Yu, MD, Medical Oncologist, Seattle.
© 1999-2011 Medstar Television
Tomikazu Susaki (tOMMY-kazoo) (SUE-sock-ee) is a chemistry professor at the University of Washington. He and other researchers have created a new chemical compound using the Chinese herb Artemisinin (ar-ti-MISS-sin-in), which, when activated by iron, kills cancer cells.
One of the essential nutrients a cancer cell needs is iron and the Artemisinin's a molecular bomb that can explode if it can be triggered by iron.
Researchers isolate the active ingredient of the herb and then attach a chemical homing device to it. This helps trick the cancer cell into letting the would-be smart bomb inside.
The real hope with this is it would be targeted and more specific against the cancer and potentially have less side effects as hopefully this would not hit normal cells as much and really target towards the cancer.
Doctor Evan Yu (YOU) is a medical oncologist. He's always looking for new therapies to treat cancer, but cautions this compound is still in the early stages of testing.
Don't run out and go buy Artemisinin and start taking it in the boat loads to treat whatever ailments you may have. This is a new drug that uses, piggy backs off Artemisinin but needs to be studied appropriately.
Clinical trials are still years off, but as this slide of a dying cancer cell shows, the new Artemisinin compound is showing promise. For WebMD, I'm Sandee LaMotte.
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