Turmeric, Curcumin Naturally Block Cancer Growth

January 30, 2012

Natural Society

By Anthony Gucciardi

“Here are two more examples of natural anti-cancer substances.”  –KTRN

Turmeric and curcumin have been highlighted as powerful anti-cancer substances in the past, but research has now shed even more light on the amazing ability of both turmeric and curcumin to actually block cancer growth. This is due to the unique ability of a main component in turmeric that is actually able to block an enzyme that promotes the spread of head and neck cancer.

Researchers at UCLA found that curcumin — the primary component in turmeric also responsible for its color — exhibited these cancer-blocking properties during a study involving 21 participants suffering from head and neck cancers. The subjects were given two chewable curcumin tablets containing 1,000 miligrams of the substance each. After administering the chewable curcumin tablets, an independent lab in Maryland was in charge of evaluating the results.

What the lab found was that the enzymes in the patients’ mouths responsible for promoting cancer spread and growth were inhibited by the curcumin supplementation. As a result, the curcumin intake halted the spread of the malignant cells. Curcumin has previously been found to reduce tumors by 81% in similarly shocking research, which also gives credence to the natural anti-cancer benefits of turmeric and curcumin intake.

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Raw Milk: Good Enough For Queen Elizabeth, But Prohibited For Ordinary Canadians

January 25, 2012

Natural News

By Ethan A. Huff

“Why does anyone care is someone wants to drink raw milk? It’s milk, people – not heroin.” –KTRN

Finding access to raw milk is difficult in many parts of the US, but the situation is even worse in Canada where national law prohibits the sale of raw milk anywhere in the country. Few people realize, however, that Queen Elizabeth and her two sons drink this supposedly “dangerous” food item, as do nearly all Canadian farmers surveyed in a 2010 study published in Preventive Veterinary Medicine.

A writeup on raw milk published in The Globe and Mail back in 2010 explains that Queen Elizabeth personally drinks raw milk, and that when her grandsons Harry and William were students at Eton College, she went out of her way to smuggle it in for them as well. The Queen apparently recognizes some value in raw milk beyond what health authorities are willing to admit.

On the same token, nearly 90 percent of more than 2,100 Canadian farmers who sell their milk to the country’s government-run dairy cartel revealed that they siphon off raw milk from their own cows to feed to their families before it gets shipped off for homogenization and pasteurization. Like the queen, these farmers are apparently unswayed by the pseudoscientific nonsense about the so-called dangers of raw milk.

And yet ordinary Canadians continue to be deprived of their freedom of choice in choosing what type of milk to drink. Those with lactose intolerance, for instance, are forced to simply stop drinking milk, as only raw milk contains the lactase enzyme that properly breaks down and digests lactose in the system. The process of pasteurization destroys lactase and all other enzymes, which makes it difficult for many to digest.

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What Big Pharma Doesn’t Want You To Know About Bromelain

January 19, 2012

Natural News

By Paul Fassa

Bromelain is an inexpensive enzyme supplement with many uses and health benefits. Enzymes don’t get much respect, yet they are considered more important functionally than vitamins and minerals. Without enzymes, food cannot be broken down into its constituent nutrients, and enzymes are needed for most cellular metabolic actions.

Bromelain, not to be confused with pharmaceutical bromaline, is a proteolytic enzyme or protease found most abundantly in pineapple cores. Protease or proteolytic enzymes are needed to digest complete proteins found in meat.

Cooking meat destroys most of the enzymes needed to break down meat’s complete proteins into amino acids that the body can use.

This puts a strain on the pancreas to create more proteolytic enzymes for the small intestines to break down the meat proteins. That strain can potentially lead to pancreatic cancer. But what’s more likely, the diversion of breaking down meat proteins takes away some other functions protease enzymes perform to keep or get you healthy.

Bromelain helps treat many modern maladies and cancer
Bromelain proteolytic enzyme supplements grant many health benefits beyond digesting whole proteins. Complete proteins are hard to digest. That’s why only proteolytic enzymes work – they’re tough enough to crack those proteins open. And if they’re tough enough for that, they can help in other areas.

Bromelain protease can dissolve internal scar tissue created from inflammation. Besides calming the inflamed area, this also takes away hiding places for pathogens to lodge. Scar tissue that hangs around is like a breeding shelter that invites disease for long term visits.

Bromelain speeds up recovery from injuries and surgeries. It has been clinically tested to prove that it enhances surgical recovery. Some naturopaths recommend it be taken before and after any surgical procedure, including dental.

Since cancer cells are protected from the immune system’s white “killer” cells by a protein wall, any cancer treatment can be augmented by adding bromelain supplements. Dr. Nicholas Gonzalez uses his own type of proteolytic enzymes with his version of William Donald Kelley’s successful innovations for curing cancer with enzymes (http://www.naturalnews.com/030050_dentist_cancer.html).

The enzymes used by Kelley and Gonzalez are super premium, used in great quantities, and expensive. They are the main thrust, a sort of natural chemo, for serious cancer cases. But bromelain protease supplements are very cheap, and can be used as a supportive adjunct with any other cancer treatment.

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The Dirty Little Secret of the Meat Industry

May 11th, 2011

Natural News

By: Mike Adams

Are you eating meat cemented together by “meat glue”? It may sound shocking and far-fetched to most people, but a recent news story covered by the Australian Today Tonight show unveils how the meat you’re eating could be made up of scraps glued together to form a deceptively “normal” piece of meat.

Just as big pharma supplies dangerous substances to countless people worldwide, the meat industry may not be far behind in such nefarious deeds. Using a special product called “meat glue”, meat suppliers have been caught using meat scraps, too small to sell, to create normal sized portions of meat for distribution. This misleading sales tactic is so effective that even experts can’t tell the difference between a regular piece of meat and a piece of meat tainted with “meat glue”.

What exactly is “meat glue”?

Meat glue is an enzyme known as transglutaminase. According to the report, many meat glues are created by cultivating bacteria. As shocking as it may sound, other meat glues are made from the blood plasma of pigs and cows, specifically the coagulant that makes blood clot. This “special enzyme” is so toxic that people working with the product must use masks as to not breathe it in. If meat suppliers are allowed to put it in our meat for us to eat, why can’t they breathe it in?

The dangers and ethics of transglutaminase

In May of 2010, the European Union moved to ban “meat glue” due to its misleading and non-beneficial properties. By allowing these fake pieces of meat to be sold incognito, consumer’s virtually have no way of telling what they are purchasing. Just as the labeling of GMO foods is not required, food manufacturers are not obligated to let consumers know which products contain toxic meat glue. Expensive steaks at many markets may actually be smaller pieces of meat held together by meat glue, making them worth a fraction of the cost and dangerous to consume.

In addition to the deception that goes along with meat glue, the risk of obtaining food poisoning associated with products that contain meat glue increases dramatically. According to the Australian television report, the bacterial contamination of meat glued steak is hundreds of times higher than authentic pieces of steak. This is also problematic due to the fact that glued meat is much harder to cook, thus making it harder to kill the bacteria. Once food poisoning is present, it is impossible to trace the exact source when multiple pieces of meat are glued together from different animals.

Conventional meat isn’t much better

Although this shocking story unveils the hazards of meat tainted with meat glue, would eating “conventional” meat products be much better? The answer is almost always “no.” Conventional meat is injected with hormones and antibiotics and is thoroughly contaminated by pesticides. Animals are often locked in small cages or are raised in prison-like farms that force the animals to consume genetically modified corn instead of grass. Although it seems like the only creatures affected by these alterations are the animals themselves, that notion is far from true. Most of the population consumes meat, and by corroding the world’s meat supply with meat glue, the human population ultimately suffers.

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Obesity May Be a Factor in Vitamin D Deficiency

January 11th, 2011

Natural News

By: Amelia Bentrup

People who weigh more have lower circulating levels of Vitamin D according to recent research conducted at the Rikshospitalet-Radiumhospitalet Medical Center in Oslo, Norway and published in the Journal of Nutrition. Lead researcher, Zoya Lagunova, MD and her colleagues measured the serum levels of Vitamin D and 1,25(OH)2D in 1,779 patients at a Medical and Metabolic Lifestyle Management Clinic in Oslo, Norway. The associations among 1,25(OH)(2)D, serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D], and body composition were analyzed. Lagunova noted that generally people with higher BMI had lower levels of Vitamin D. Age, season, and gender were also found to influence serum 1,25(OH)(2)D.

Vitamin D is not a true vitamin, but rather a vitamin-steroid thought to play a key role in the prevention of cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, multiple sclerosis and other diseases. It is likely not coincidental that obesity is also a risk factor for many of these diseases.

Vitamin D is vital to the regulation of calcium. Studies have shown that calcium deficiency increases the production of synthase, an enzyme that converts calories into fat. It has been shown that calcium deficiency can increase synthase production by up to 500 percent. Vitamin D has also been shown to play a role in the regulation of blood sugar levels; proper blood sugar regulation is vital to the maintenance of a healthy weight.

Vitamin D is produced from sunlight and converted into various metabolites. It is stored in fat tissue. According to Lagunova, obese people may take in as much Vitamin D as other people; however, because it is stored in fat it may be less available. This may result in lower circulating levels of Vitamin D.

A previous study conducted by Shalamar Sibley, MD, MPH, an assistant professor of medicine at the University of Minnesota, showed that subjects who have higher levels of Vitamin D at the start of a weight loss diet lose more weight than those with lower levels. The study measured Vitamin D levels of 38 overweight men and women both before and after following an 11-week calorie-restricted diet. Vitamin D levels at the start of diet was an accurate predictor of weight loss…those with higher levels of Vitamin D lost more weight. It was found that for every nanogram increase in Vitamin D precursor, there was an 1/2 pound increase in weight loss.

Seventy-five percent or more of Americans, teenage and older, are Vitamin D deficient according to a recent study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine. According to the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index, 26.5% of American are obese. More research needs to be conducted into the exact role Vitamin D plays in obesity and weight loss and the possibility of increased Vitamin D consumption (through the form of supplementation and/or increased sun exposure) being a key factor to achieving a healthy weight.

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Aspartame Exposed – GM Bacteria Used to Create Deadly Sweetener

January 6th, 2011

Natural News

By: Anthony Gucciardi

The manufacturers of the most prevalent sweetener in the world have a secret, and it`s not a sweet one. Aspartame, an artificial sweetener found in thousands of products worldwide, has been found to be created using genetically modified (GM) bacteria. What`s even more shocking is how long this information has been known. A 1999 article by The Independent was the first to expose the abominable process in which aspartame was created. Ironically, the discovery was made around the same time as rich leaders around the globe met at the G8 Summit to discuss the safety of GM foods.

The 1999 investigation found that Monsanto, the largest biotech corporation in the world, often used GM bacteria to produce aspartame in their US production plants. The end result is a fusion between two of the largest health hazards to ever hit the food industry — artificial sweeteners and an array of genetically altered organisms. Both have led to large-scale debate, with aspartame being the subject of multiple congressional hearings and scientific criticism. Scientists and health advocates are not the only ones to speak out against aspartame, however. The FDA received a flurry of complaints from consumers using NutraSweet, a product containing aspartame. Since 1992, the FDA has stopped documenting reports on the subject.

The process in which aspartame is created involves combining an amino acid known as phenylalanine with aspartic acid. First synthesized in 1965, aspartame requires bacteria for the sole purpose of producing phenylalanine. Monsanto discovered that through genetically altering this bacteria, phenylalanine could be created much more quickly. In the report by The Independent, Monsanto openly admitted that their mutated bacteria is a staple in the creation process of aspartame.

“We have two strains of bacteria – one is traditionally modified and one is genetically modified,” said the source from Monsanto. “It’s got a modified enzyme. It has one amino acid different.”

Multiple studies have been conducted regarding genetic manipulation, with many grim conclusions. One study found that the more GM corn was fed to mice, the fewer babies they had. Another study, published in the International Journal of Biological Sciences, found that the organs that typically respond to chemical food poisoning were the first to encounter problems after subjects consumed GM foods. The same study also states that GM foods should not be commercialized.

“For the first time in the world, we’ve proven that GMO are neither sufficiently healthy nor proper to be commercialized. [...] Each time, for all three GMOs, the kidneys and liver, which are the main organs that react to a chemical food poisoning, had problems,” indicated Gilles-Eric Seralini, an expert member of the Commission for Biotechnology Reevaluation.

Consumer groups are now curious as to whether or not other products secretly contain genetically modified ingredients. Due to the fact that the finished product`s DNA does not change when using genetically modified bacteria, it is hard to know for sure. With the FDA ruling against the labeling of GM salmon, it is becoming more of a challenge to determine whether or not a product contains GM ingredients. Consumers are voicing their opposition for GM ingredients going incognito, with the largest growing retail brand being GMO-free products.

“The public wants to know and the public has a right to know,” said Marion Nestle, a professor in the Nutrition, Food Studies and Public Health Department at New York University.

Unveiling the secret process in which aspartame is created acts as yet another reminder to stay away from artificial sweeteners, and one should choose natural alternatives such as palm sugar, xylitol, or stevia.

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Olive Oil Protects Liver

November 1st, 2010

Natural News

By: Ethan A. Huff

You may want to drizzle a little extra olive oil on your next salad, according to findings from a new study out of the University of Monastir in Tunisia and King Saud University in Saudi Arabia. Researchers there found that extra virgin olive oil provides powerful antioxidant protection against toxins that cause oxidative stress and damage to the liver.

“Olive oil is an integral ingredient in the Mediterranean diet,” explained Mohamed Hammami, author of the study. “There is growing evidence that it may have great health benefits including the reduction in coronary heart disease risk, the prevention of some cancers, and the modification of immune and inflammatory responses.”

Hammami and his team tested the effects of olive oil on a group of rats exposed to a toxic herbicide called ’2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid’ that causes severe liver damage. Compared to control group rats who received no olive oil, the rats that consumed extra virgin olive oil in the presence of the herbicide experienced significantly increased antioxidant enzyme activity and a decrease in the biomarkers of liver damage.

“The hydrophilic fraction of olive oil seems to be the effective one in reducing toxin-induced oxidative stress, indicating that hydrophilic extract may exert a direct antioxidant effect on hepatic (fat-storing) cells,” added Hammami.

Besides providing a powerful antioxidant effect, olive oil is a highly effective anti-cancer food. It is also responsible for regulating gene expression for nearly 100 different genes throughout the body. Olive is also beneficial for maintaining a healthy weight, lowering bad cholesterol, improving heart health, and prolonging life.

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Calorie-Burning Fat Could Help You Lose Weight

May 11, 2010

Time

By Alice Park

It might turn out to be the ultimate irony in our constant battle with the bulge that the best weapon against fat could be fat.

Scientists know that a type of adipose tissue called brown fat tends to burn calories rather than store them. Most adults have far more white fat than brown fat, since it’s more important to store calories for future use than to use them up. But when it comes to weight loss, the energy-burning power of brown fat could actually prove useful. And based on continuing research in mice, it appears that researchers have found some promising ways to exploit its fast-acting features. This week, in a study published in the journal Science, a group of European scientists, led by Stephan Herzig at the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg, report that they have discovered a way to make regular white fat act more like the calorie-hungry brown fat and melt away pounds in overweight animals.

The researchers focused on an enzyme known as cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2), which is involved in a variety of physiologic functions, from regulating blood pressure to controlling inflammation and contracting muscles. (The class of painkillers known as COX-2 inhibitors, like Celebrex, takes advantage of COX-2′s role in inflammation by clamping down on the enzyme’s activity.)

In mice, boosting the function of COX-2 caused the animals’ white fat to act like brown fat, and led to a 20% drop in their weight. “There has been a lot of excitement around brown fat, but … there wasn’t any clear indication that turning up brown fat would make animals lose weight,” says Chad Cowan, a professor in the Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology at Harvard Medical School who studies fat cell development. “What this paper does is make a good link to something that might be clinically beneficial.”

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Science Mimicking Photosynthesis in Artificial Leaves

March 1, 2010

Natural News

By David Gutierrez

Researchers from Imperial College London have launched a £1 million ($1.6 million) study to create what they call an “artificial leaf,” mimicking the process of photosynthesis that allows plants to generate energy from the sun.

Plants use solar radiation to power a chemical reaction that converts water and carbon dioxide into sugar. Part of this reaction entails splitting water molecules into their component hydrogen and oxygen parts, something that remains very expensive using modern technology.

Photosynthesis is so efficient, however, that scientists estimate that it could meet all the Earth’s power needs for a year from merely an hour of sunlight. An artificial photosynthesis system that used only 10 percent of the light hitting it could meet all global energy needs if it covered only 0.16 percent of the Earth’s surface area (about 315,000 square miles).

“We know that plants have already evolved to do it and we know that, fundamentally, it’s a workable process on a large scale,” said John Loughhead of the UK Energy Research Center. “Ultimately, the only sustainable form of energy we’ve got is the sun. From a strategic viewpoint, you have to think this looks really interesting because we know we’re starting from a base of feasibility.”

In contrast to other alternative energy sources such as solar panels or windmills, which produce electricity directly, the Imperial College researchers want to use photosynthesis to produce fuels — either hydrogen for fuel cells, or sugars for biofuel engines. Even though the burning of these fuels would still produce carbon dioxide, the researchers believe it would be balanced out by the carbon dioxide that the artificial leaf removed from the air to make the fuel in the first place.

As one of their first steps, researchers are working on an artificial copy of the enzyme, photosystem 2, that plants use to split water into hydrogen and oxygen.

“It doesn’t mean that you try to build exactly what the leaf has,” researcher James Barber said. “Leonardo da Vinci tried to design flying machines with feathers that flapped up and down. But in the end we built 747s and Airbus 380s, completely different to a bird.”

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Vitamin E – After a Stroke

January 22, 2010

Natural News

S.L. Baker

A stroke occurs when the blood supply to part of the brain is suddenly blocked by a blood clot or when a blood vessel in the brain bursts, driving blood into the spaces surrounding brain cells, or neurons. The result can be brain damage that leaves stroke survivors with disabilities ranging from one-sided paralysis or weakness to problems with thinking, attention, memory and learning. But new research by Ohio State University scientists set for publication in an upcoming edition of the Journal of Neurochemistry concludes a specific type of vitamin E known as tocotrienol (TCT) could prevent brain cells from dying after a stroke.

Tocopherols are the best-known form of vitamin E and the kind usually found in supplements. However, the vitamin occurs naturally in seven other different forms, including TCT. Although not widely found in the typical American diet, it is common in foods that comprise a typical Southeast Asian diet. Food sources of TCT include rice bran oil, barley, wheat germ and oats.

“Our research suggests that the different forms of natural vitamin E have distinct functions. The relatively poorly studied tocotrienol form of natural vitamin E targets specific pathways to protect against neural cell death and rescues the brain after stroke injury,” Chandan Sen, professor and vice chair for research in Ohio State’s Department of Surgery and senior author of the study, said in a statement to the media.

Over the past decade, the Ohio State University research team has studied how this form of vitamin E protects the brain in animal and cell models. But according to Dr. Sen, their new study provides specific details about how that protection works. Bottom line: they’ve identified an enzyme called cystolic calcium-dependent phospholipase A2 (cPLA2, for short) that tocotrienol targets to protect neurons after a stroke.

“We have studied an enzyme that is present all the time, but one that is activated after a stroke in a way that causes neurodegeneration. We found that it can be put in check by very low levels of tocotrienol,” Dr. Sen said. “So what we have here is a naturally derived nutrient, rather than a drug, that provides this beneficial impact.”

The researchers explained that the blocked blood flow to the brain associated with a stroke causes an excess of the neurotransmitter glutamate to be released. In normal amounts, glutamate is beneficial and important for memory and learning. But when produced in large amounts due to the brain trauma of a stroke, it triggers a cascade of reactions that leads to the death of neurons and causes the most serious stroke damage.

For their study, Dr. Sen and colleagues took cells from the hippocampus region of developing mouse brains and added excess glutamate to produce the type of changes seen in the brain after a stroke. In the presence of excess glutamate, the cPLA2 enzyme released a fatty acid called arachidonic acid which normally helps maintain the stability of health cell membranes. Under stroke conditions, however, with high levels of glutamate present, arachidonic acid undergoes an enzymatic chemical reaction that makes it toxic — then brain cells are poisoned and start to die.

But when the researchers added tocotrienol to the cells that had been exposed to excess glutamate, the vitamin E decreased the release of fatty acids by 60 percent when compared to cells exposed to glutamate alone. What’s more, the brain cells treated with the TCT form of vitamin E were about four times more likely to survive than brain cells exposed to glutamate alone.

In the press statement, Dr. Sen noted that the amount of TCT needed to achieve these brain cell protecting effects is quite small — a concentration about 10 times lower than the average amount of tocotrienol circulating in humans who consume this form of vitamin E regularly. The Ohio State University researchers intend to continue their research to see if TCT can successfully prevent and treat strokes in humans.

Editor’s note: NaturalNews is opposed to the use of animals in medical experiments that expose them to harm. We present these findings in protest of the way in which they were acquired.

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