POTATOES could hold the cure for cancer trends now
Potatoes, tomatoes and aubergines could hold the key to beating cancer, experts believe.
Polish researchers think bioactive compounds in vegetables can also help patients dodge the brutal side effects of existing treatments.
They say studies have suggested that glycoalkaloids, naturally occurring chemicals also found in peppers, goji berries and huckleberries, posses some cancer-fighting properties.
Scientists say glycoalkaloids — naturally occurring chemicals found in potatoes — have cancer-fighting properties that could halt cancer-causing chemicals in their tracks
Although hugely successful at killing cancer cells, chemotherapy can trigger an array of unpleasant side effects like hair loss, nausea and fatigue.
This is because the drugs inadvertently kill healthy cells elsewhere in the body, alongside targeting the cancerous ones.
Magdalena Winkiel, of Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, and colleagues said this made it worth re-examining the properties of medicinal plants.
Her team reviewed the evidence on glycoalkaloids — compounds abundant in the Solanacease family of plants, which includes potatoes, tomatoes and aubergines.
In the correct doses, these chemicals can be 'powerful clinical tools', Ms Winkiel's team said.
They focused on five glycoalkaloids — solanine, chaconine, solasonine, solamargine and tomatine — which Ms Winkiel believes could be used to develop drugs in the future.
The findings, set out in Frontiers in Pharmacology, detail that solanine has been shown to stop potentially carcinogenic chemicals — those known to cause cancer — from transforming into carcinogens in the body.
Studies on one particular type of leukemia cell also showed, in small doses, solanine kills them.
Meanwhile, chaconine has anti-inflammatory properties, with the potential to treat sepsis, the team said.
Solamargine can stop liver cancer cells from reproducing, research has suggested.
Researchers say it could be a crucial complementary treatment because it targets cancer stem cells, which are thought to play a significant role in cancer drug resistance.
Solasonine is thought to work in a similar fashion.
Tomatine supports the body's regulation of cell cycles, helping the body kill cancer cells, according to the findings.
But there has been no research yet done on how the chemicals can fight cancer in human cells, one of the earliest stages of research.
Ms Winkiel said these tests are vital to confirm which glycoalkaloids are 'safe and promising enough to test in humans'.
She added: 'Scientists around the world are still searching for the drugs which will be lethal to cancer cells but at the same time safe for healthy cells.
'It is not easy despite the advances in medicine and powerful development of modern treatment techniques.
'That is why it might be worth going back to medicinal plants that were used years ago with success in the treatment of various ailments.'
Ms Winkiel noted that if the chemicals 'cannot replicate anticancer drugs that are used nowadays, maybe combined therapy will increase the effectiveness of treatment'.
Plants have been used to fight cancer for decades, such as chemotherapy medication Taxol, which is made from tree bark.
But there is no research that says simply eating your five a day will kill cancer cells, even if a healthy diet may help to prevent tumours in the first place.
They are not a substitute for cancer treatment, such as chemo, radiotherapy and surgery, which can cure people of the disease if caught early enough.
Dr Charles Evans, research information manager at Cancer Research UK, said: 'Plants produce a huge and diverse range of interesting and understudied chemicals.
'Some of these chemicals have anti-cancer effects when tested in the lab and some, such as Taxol, have even
