Standing up

Standing up

Astragalus and immune boosting.

 by John Fahey on 06/11/10

It's interesting that Geron has granted a license to TASciences to market a purified astragalus extract as a telomerase activation agent with the intent of delaying cellular aging.

Read about Geron at....Wikipedia

There must surely be a story to be told about how a chinese herbal remedy used for thousands of years for various ailments first came to the attention of Geron's scientists then their discovery of a group of related compounds in the extract all to a differing degree capable of significant biological activity and clinical significance.

That this herb...astragalus..got the attention of scientists at a company like...Geron...is understandable since it is within the orbit of the general scope of the mission of Geron.

That...TASciences...has quickly launched into this new age is also understandable.

However the protocol and tests being offered by TASciences are expensive and the TA-65 and the particular single component extract is but one approach.

A well written article in Natural News points out that the astragalus root contains cycloastragenols and astragalosides, two powerful molecules that have been implicated in activating telomerase enzyme production. Research suggests that large doses of these molecules have the potential to not only prevent telomere depletion but to actually rebuild the telomere that has been already lost.

Extracts and derivative formulas are hitting the supplement market that contain potent levels of these molecules. Certain specific varieties of astragalus root naturally contain high levels of these powerful molecules and the extracts can be purchased inexpensively in bulk powders or in capsules so this is another approach.

Astragalus capsules are cheaply available from LIfe Extension and Puritan Pride. 

In the meantime while TASciences explores telomerase activation with their clients, and other studies aim at seeing how astragalus activated immune enhancement could be an adjuvant in cancer chemotherapy, I will make four capsules of astragalus a day part of my regular regimen. 

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Cui and the immune mouse.

 by John Fahey on 06/10/10

It's the human beginning to a journey begun on by a mouse over ten years ago. That mouse was found to have an immune system making it completely resistant to all kinds of cancers and that immunity was transferable to other mice. Dr. Zheng Cui then found himself at the center of controversy and speculation on the thought of finding similar rare cancer immune individuals in the human population and persuading them to be granulocyte donors to treat cancer patients. 

Now the Life Extension Foundation has given seed money to The South Florida Bone Marrow/Stem Cell Transplant Institute in order to identify individuals with blood leucocytes (granulocytes and monocytes) making that individual cancer resistant. It's known that some people's immune cells can be 50 times more effective than others. Earlier studies have shown the leucocyte anti-cancer activity can wane with age, fluctuate with season, and even fall in cases of depression.

Read about it in this Life Extension Magazine ...article.

So the search is on.....looking for healthy young people

It certainly is a quest. Finding the few individuals in each hundred who could be invited to become part of a donor registry to be on call to have some of their blood passed through a pheresis machine to collect some of their super-charged granulocytes will have to become a continuing campaign.

Becoming a granulocyte donor begins with.....an application

The Principal Investigator, Dr. Dipnarine Maharaj, Director of the South Florida Bone Marrow/Stem Cell Transplant Institute, will direct this granulocyte transfer to 29 patients with protocol 08001-BMSCTI. However that is as yet in the future, awaiting identification of enough granulocyte donors, and the need for firm funding of at least $5 million to enroll patients and run the trial.

It is remarkable to contemplate that this is the possible beginning of a remarkable human journey toward transferable cancer immunity. That it comes from Dr. Dipnarine Maharaj's Institute is most fitting. 

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And looking out

 by John Fahey on 06/09/10

See the wonder.

 

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It is a crisis of monumental proportions. But why has this happened? After all, it was known in the 1920s that vitamin D deficiency was the cause of rickets in children, the Nobel prize in chemistry was awarded in 1928 to the scientist who discovered the precursor to Vitamin D3, derived from cholesterol and converted to Vitamin D3 by the action of the uv in sunlight on the skin. The US, and many other countries, mandated the addition of Vitamin D3 to milk and other products in the 1930s, we knew we could get vitamin D3 from fish and generations of children grew up detesting that spoon of cod liver oil before going to school. Yet rickets are being sporadically reported around the US, particularly among infants exclusively breast fed, and experts tell us that Vitamin D3 deficiency is widespread in the population and doubles the incidence of many cancers and other diseases. What happened?

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It was not until laboratory technology reached the stage where accurate measurements of circulating Vitamin D3 in blood could be inexpensively done in large numbers of people that troubling results emerged. It is now known that many people, including infants, children, and adolescents, have a level of circulating Vitamin D3 below an optimal, and in some cases very sub-optimal, level. Finnish researchers were among the first to sound the alarm. Other researchers, measuring the actual levels of circulating Vitamin D3 in their patients and following the incidence of disease in those patients were stunned by their findings.

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It is a national health crisis and will continue to be so until supplementation becomes a routine part of health maintenance for all. We are fortunate that reliable sources of Vitamin D3 exist and are remarkably inexpensive. Those tiny capsules of Vitamin D3 can do so much to reduce your risk for many diseases. Do not neglect this simple health precaution. Help others. Inform them, make them aware.  

                                                 ErinPharm  Vitamin d3

                                    
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