Wow, VERY EXCITING BIT OF NEWS that popped up in my Google Alerts yesterday.

My post title is the title of a new study revealing a previously unreported biochemical activity of curcumin. This very important study, carried out by three research teams (University of California San Diego School of Medicine, Peking University, and Zhejiang University), shows how curcumin attaches to, and INHIBITS, a gene called DYRK2, which is associated with cellular growth and/or development. This inhibition diminishes the proliferation of cancer cells. It reduces the tumor burden. 

How about THAT?

Here’s the link to the University of California San Diego School of Medicine press release: goo.gl/XPUz6G

Quote: “DYRK2 depletion impairs proteasome activity and exhibits slower cancer proliferation rates and significantly reduced tumor burden in mouse models. In combination with the FDA-approved multiple myeloma drug, carfilzomib, curcumin induced a much higher cancer cell death while normal non-cancerous cells were less affected. This suggest that targeting proteasome regulators (such as DYRK2) in combination with proteasome inhibitors may be a promising approach of anticancer therapy with less side-effects but further work is needed, said Banerjee.”

Curcumin plus carfilzomib = HIGHER MM CELL DEATH. Food for thought.

One of the researchers involved in the study states the following: “In general, curcumin is expelled from the body quite fast. […] For curcumin to be an effective drug, it needs to be modified to enter the blood stream and stay in the body long enough to target the cancer. Owing to various chemical drawbacks, curcumin on its own may not be sufficient to completely reverse cancer in human patients.”

I agree, of course. I never thought curcumin would (reverse cancer, that is, etc.). But I was also told by an expert that curcumin gets absorbed by our tissues, slurp slurp slurp!!!, within ten minutes or so after we swallow it. Well, whatever the case, curcumin has done me (and many of you, too!!!) a world of good in the past 12 and a half years…

And that is why, while waiting for researchers to come up with a truly effective, modified form of curcumin, I’m going to keep taking my daily eight grams of C3 Complex.  

Well, well. Curcumin never ceases to “wow” me, that’s for sure…