WINDSOR, Ont. -- Windsor scientists whove recently confirmed that dandelion root extract inhibits the growth of tumours in mice have landed a $157,500 grant to help advance their research toward proving it kills cancer in humans.

University of Windsor biochemist Siyaram Pandey said Thursday the grant from the B.C.-based Lotte and John Hecht Memorial Foundation is an exciting development. However, he added, hell be more excited should his team get approval for Phase I clinical trials from Health Canada, hopefully by the fall.

I think we managed to convince them with our published work, No. 1. No. 2, with our logic and going for a natural way of treating this, and No. 3, the fact that, if approved, people can take it safely at home.

Pandey emphasized the role played by local funders who believed in his work when the larger funding agencies in the country considered it a snake oil idea. First came the Knights of Columbuss council in St. Clair Beach, which gave $6,000 to help with initial research based on observations by Pandeys co-applicant Dr. Caroline Hamm.

Hamm, a Windsor Cancer Centre oncologist, noticed a number of patients whose conditions improved at least initially after they started to drink dandelion root tea as an alternative when traditional chemotherapy didnt work.

Their initial findings were enough to justify a $60,000 grant from Seeds4Hope, which provides seed money for local cancer research, in hope that promising results will receive further funding from the big national agencies. Pandey and his students got their initial samples of extract by digging the weeds out of local lawns.

This just matches exactly what we were hoping would happen when Seeds4Hope was established four years ago, said program administrator Michael Dufresne. This is the first example of local research receiving major funding as a result of a one-time infusion from Seeds4Hope.

He said the dandelion root extract results pose a brilliant possibility.

I say possibility because a lot still has to be done, but the potential is there.

The Windsor researchers have shown in the lab that the extract causes cancer cells to commit suicide, while not harming healthy cells, something that usually happens when toxic chemotherapy drugs are used.

See original here:
Funding aids search for cancer killer