Dandelion root found to induce cancer cells ‘suicide,’ while leaving healthy ones alone
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Those yellow dots that “litter” your otherwise “perfectly green” lawn is more than just pesky weeds. Dandelion has been considered a valuable food and medicine in both Eastern and Western cultures for thousands of years and is now being researched for its cancer-fighting abilities. The use of the dandelion plant in both Greek and Chinese medicine predates written records. Traditional healers use it to cleanse the liver, flush toxins from the kidneys and purify the blood. Its blood purifying compounds led researchers at the University of Windsor in Canada to hypothesize that dandelion could help patients with end-stage blood cancer. They inserted dandelion root extract into Petri dishes with blood drawn from leukemia patients and lab rats. To their delight, the dandelion root induced apoptosis or “cell suicide” in cancer cells, while leaving healthy cells alone. Dandelion root’s ability to selectively kill only cancer cells — as...