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Can Blueberries Shrink Cancer Cells?

Jun 15, 2011 | By Bonnie Vanaman
Can Blueberries Shrink Cancer Cells?
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Many health experts are adding blueberries to their list of super foods, including a team of USDA nutritionists reporting in the "Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry," who placed both wild and cultivated blueberries as two of their top five antioxidant foods in 2004. Blueberries are rich in anthocyanins, which research is showing may prevent or stop the rapid growth of cancer cells. Since human trials are lacking, it's not time to ditch traditional cancer therapy just yet, but adding blueberries to your diet may be a healthy move.

Breast Cancer

Researchers at the Beckman Research Institute in Duarte, California, applied blueberry extracts to cell lines of triple-negative breast cancer, a type of tumor that is not hormone-driven, making it hard to treat. The results on mice, published in "Cancer Research" in May 2010, showed that after six weeks, the mice receiving blueberry extract had tumors that were 70 percent smaller and also less likely to migrate.

Colon Cancer

One type of anthocyanin that blueberries contain is called pterostilbene, which may fight colon cancer. In a study published in "Carcinogenesis" in July 2010, rats fed blueberry-derived pterostilbene for eight weeks had 57 percent fewer precancerous colon lesions as compared to a control group.

Esophageal Cancer

Scientists at Ohio State University in Columbus tested seven different berry extracts, including blueberry, on esophageal cancer in rats. The findings, presented in the June 2010 issue of "Pharmaceutical Research," showed that rats fed the extracts had about half as many tumors as the control group, which the researchers attributed to the cancer-fighting compounds ellagitannin and anthocyanin.

Liver Cancer

A study published in the journal "Food Research International" in 2006 treated pterostilbene on liver cancer cells in the lab. The cells treated with the berry pterostilbene extract showed 50 percent inhibition of the cancer cell population growth.

Lung Cancer

Pterostilbene from blueberries was also tested on two lung cancer cell lines in a study at the University of Vermont Department of Surgery. The findings, which were reported in June 2010 in the "Journal of Surgical Research," demonstrated that pterostilbene significantly decreased cell viability in both lung cancer cell lines within 72 hours of administration.

Pediatric Blood Vessel Tumors

Angiogenic tumors, found in blood vessels, are among the most common tumors in infants. A report in "Antioxidants & Redox Signaling" in 2009 showed that mice with this type of tumor that were fed blueberry extract lived twice as long as a control group and had tumors 60 percent smaller than mice in control groups.

Prostate Tumors

An Australian product called Blueberry Punch, containing blueberry, grape, raspberry and elderberry, was tested in trials on mice with prostate cancer. The researchers published their findings in the "Journal of Nutrition" in April 2010 that the mice given 10 percent Blueberry Punch in drinking water for two weeks had a 25 percent decrease in tumor volume compared with the control. They also found that in vitro, the Blueberry Punch reduced protein concentrations in three signaling pathways that can lead to the proliferation and survival of prostate cancer cells.

References

Article reviewed by TimDog Last updated on: Jun 15, 2011

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