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Last Updated: Apr 20, 2011 - 9:38:09 AM |
WEDNESDAY JAN 30, 2008 (Foodconsumer.org) -- Drinking green tea may help protect against development of gastric cancer, according to a study by Japanese researchers who published the results in the Feb. 2008 issue of the Journal of Clinical Biochemistry and Nutrition.
Early studies have linked stomach cancer to infections of Helicobacter pylori, which is known to stimulate gastric epithelial cell proliferation and apoptosis.
Akai Y. at the Nihon University School of Medicine in Tokyo, Japan and colleagues tested green tea polyphenols in a mouse model and found that natural compounds inhibited apoptosis and cell proliferation.
In the study, mice were inoculated with H. pylori and lived for 18 months without any intervention. Afterwards, mice were fed drinking water with 0.5% polyphenols every day for 2 weeks.
The researchers found mice with H. pylori infection that were not given green tea polyphenols increased cell proliferation in both the antrum and the bodies, but the increased cells were not found in the mice that were infected with the bacteria, but also administered green tea polyphenols.
H. pylori infection also increased apoptosis in the infected mice that did not receive polyphenols. But mice receiving the natural compounds did not experience the increased apoptosis.
The researchers concluded "the administration with polyphenols might suppress gastric carcinogenesis that is in part related to H. pylori infection."
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