A Possible Synergistic Herbal Solution for COVID-19.

The COVID-19 pandemic has provided an opportunity for repurposing of drugs, including complex, natural drugs, to meet the global need for safe and effective antiviral medicines which do not promote multidrug resistance nor inflate medical costs. The author herein describes his own repurposing of herbal tinctures, previously prepared for oncology, into a possibly synergistic, anti-COVID 41 "herb" formula of extracts derived from 36 different plants and medicinal mushrooms. A method of multi-sample testing in green monkey kidney vero cells is proposed for testing the Hypothesis that even in such a large combination, antiviral potency may be preserved, along with therapeutic synergy, smoothness, and complexity.

A review of pears (Pyrus spp.), ancient functional food for modern times.

Background: Pears have been world-widely used as a sweet and nutritious food and a folk medicine for more than two millennia.

Methods: We conducted a review from ancient literatures to current reports to extract evidence-based functions of pears.

Results: We found that pears have many active compounds, e.

High environmental stress yields greater tocotrienol content while changing vitamin e profiles of wild emmer wheat seeds.

Vitamin E is an essential human nutrient that was first isolated from wheat. Emmer wheat, the cereal of Old World agriculture and a precursor to durum wheat, grows wild in the Fertile Crescent. Evolution Canyon, Israel, provides a microsite that models effects of contrasting environments.

Increases in both acute and chronic temperature potentiate tocotrienol concentrations in wild barley at 'Evolution Canyon'.

Biosynthesis of tocols (vitamin E isoforms) is linked to response to temperature in plants. 'Evolution Canyon', an ecogeographical microcosm extending over an average of 200 meters (range 100-400) wide area in the Carmel Mountains of northern Israel, has been suggested as a model for studying global warming. Both domestic (Hordeum vulgare) and wild (Hordeum spontaneum) barley compared with wheat, oat, corn, rice, and rye show high tocotrienol/tocopherol ratios.

Cannabis induces a clinical response in patients with Crohn's disease: a prospective placebo-controlled study.

Background & Aims: The marijuana plant Cannabis sativa has been reported to produce beneficial effects for patients with inflammatory bowel diseases, but this has not been investigated in controlled trials. We performed a prospective trial to determine whether cannabis can induce remission in patients with Crohn's disease.

Methods: We studied 21 patients (mean age, 40 ± 14 y; 13 men) with Crohn's Disease Activity Index (CDAI) scores greater than 200 who did not respond to therapy with steroids, immunomodulators, or anti-tumor necrosis factor-α agents.

Anticancer potential of aloes: antioxidant, antiproliferative, and immunostimulatory attributes.

Aloe is a genus of medicinal plants with a notable history of medical use. Basic research over the past couple of decades has begun to reveal the extent of Aloe's pharmaceutical potential, particularly against neoplastic disease. This review looks at Aloe, both the genus and the folk medicine, often being called informally "aloes", and delineates their chemistry and anticancer pharmacognosy.

Anticancer attributes of desert plants: a review.

The ever-increasing emergence of the resistance of mammalian tumor cells to chemotherapy and its severe side effects reduces the clinical efficacy of a large variety of anticancer agents that are currently in use. Thus, despite the significant progress in cancer therapeutics in the last decades, the need to discover and to develop new, alternative, or synergistic anticancer agents remains. Cancer prevention or chemotherapy based on bioactive fractions or pure components derived from desert plants with known cancer-inhibiting properties suggests promising alternatives to current cancer therapy.

'Tocol-omic' diversity in wild barley, short communication.

Hordeum spontaneum, wild barley, is the direct progenitor of domestic barley, Hordeum vulgare, an economically important ingredient of animal feed, beer, soy sauce, and more recently, of nutraceuticals. Domestic barley has also been used in the past as a medicine. Barley is a rich source of tocotrienols, with α-tocotrienol being the most prevalent.

Pomegranate-mediated chemoprevention of experimental hepatocarcinogenesis involves Nrf2-regulated antioxidant mechanisms.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), one of the most prevalent and lethal cancers, has shown an alarming rise in the USA. Without effective therapy for HCC, novel chemopreventive strategies may effectively circumvent the current morbidity and mortality. Oxidative stress predisposes to hepatocarcinogenesis and is the major driving force of HCC.

Pomegranate (Punica granatum) seed linolenic acid isomers: concentration-dependent modulation of estrogen receptor activity.

Pomegranate (Punica granatum) seed linolenic acid isomers were evaluated as selective estrogen receptor modulators (SERMs) in vitro. Punicic acid (PA) inhibited (IC(50)) estrogen receptor (ER) alpha at 7.2 microM, ERbeta at 8.

Pomegranate fruit extract impairs invasion and motility in human breast cancer.

Purpose: Pomegranate fruit extracts (PFEs) possess polyphenolic and other compounds with antiproliferative, pro-apoptotic and anti-inflammatory effects in prostate, lung, and other cancers. Because nuclear transcription factor-kB (NF-kB) is known to regulate cell survival, proliferation, tumorigenesis, and inflammation, it was postulated that PFEs may exert anticancer effects at least in part by modulating NF-kB activity.

Experimental Design: The authors investigated the effect of a novel, defined PFE consisting of both fermented juice and seed oil on the NF-kB pathway, which is constitutively active in aggressive breast cancer cell lines.

Ficus spp. (fig): ethnobotany and potential as anticancer and anti-inflammatory agents.

This review explores medieval, ancient and modern sources for ethnopharmacological uses of Ficus (fig) species, specifically for employment against malignant disease and inflammation. The close connection between inflammatory/infectious and cancerous diseases is apparent both from the medieval/ancient merging of these concepts and the modern pharmacological recognition of the initiating and promoting importance of inflammation for cancer growth. Also considered are chemical groups and compounds underlying the anticancer and anti-inflammatory actions, the relationship of fig wasps and fig botany, extraction and storage of fig latex, and traditional methods of preparing fig medicaments including fig lye, fig wine and medicinal poultices.

Punica granatum: heuristic treatment for diabetes mellitus.

The current diabetes epidemic is a global concern with readily available effective therapies or preventative measures in demand. One natural product with such potential is the pomegranate (Punica granatum), with hypoglycemic activity noted from its flowers, seeds, and juice in canons of the traditional folk medicines of India. The mechanisms for such effects are largely unknown, though recent research suggests pomegranate flowers and juice may prevent diabetic sequelae via peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-gamma binding and nitric oxide production.

Punica granatum (pomegranate) and its potential for prevention and treatment of inflammation and cancer.

The last 7 years have seen over seven times as many publications indexed by Medline dealing with pomegranate and Punica granatum than in all the years preceding them. Because of this, and the virtual explosion of interest in pomegranate as a medicinal and nutritional product that has followed, this review is accordingly launched. The pomegranate tree, Punica granatum, especially its fruit, possesses a vast ethnomedical history and represents a phytochemical reservoir of heuristic medicinal value.

Transcendental meditation: a double-edged sword in epilepsy?

Transcendental Meditation (TM) is derived from ancient yogic teachings. Both short- and long-term physiological correlates of TM practice have been studied. EEG effects include increased alpha, theta, and gamma frequencies and increased coherence and synchrony.

Meditation and epilepsy: a still hung jury.

Meditation has been advocated as a treatment for several medical problems, including epilepsy. Conversely, concern has been raised that meditation may aggravate or even precipitate epilepsy. We present a case of new onset mesial temporal lobe epilepsy in a young woman meditator lacking other apparent risk factors for epilepsy as a springboard for a balanced discussion concerning the potential relationship between meditation and epilepsy, and a criticism of the current literature in this field.

Beware of pomegranates bearing 40% ellagic Acid.

A recent profusion of pomegranate nutraceutical products, "standardized to 40% ellagic acid," has appeared in the marketplace. This Perspective reviews the chemical and functional studies of pomegranate as well as the virtues and dangers of ellagic acid, and concludes that synergy among the various pomegranate fractions and phytochemicals is the most important factor for assessing strength of pomegranate nutraceutical preparations, and not simply the concentration of ellagic acid. Ellagic acid concentration in final products is likely to have an optimal therapeutic range, which very likely is less than 40%.

Pomegranate as a cosmeceutical source: pomegranate fractions promote proliferation and procollagen synthesis and inhibit matrix metalloproteinase-1 production in human skin cells.

Pomegranate (Punica granatum) is an ancient fruit with exceptionally rich ethnomedical applications. The peel (pericarp) is well regarded for its astringent properties; the seeds for conferring invulnerability in combat and stimulating beauty and fertility. Here, aqueous fractions prepared from the fruit's peel and fermented juice and lipophilic fractions prepared from pomegranate seeds were examined for effects on human epidermal keratinocyte and human dermal fibroblast function.

Pomegranate (Punica granatum) pure chemicals show possible synergistic inhibition of human PC-3 prostate cancer cell invasion across Matrigel.

Four pure chemicals, ellagic acid (E), caffeic acid (C), luteolin (L) and punicic acid (P), all important components of the aqueous compartments or oily compartment of pomegranate fruit (Punica granatum), and each belonging to different representative chemical classes and showing known anticancer activities, were tested as potential inhibitors of in vitro invasion of human PC-3 prostate cancer cells in an assay employing Matrigel artificial membranes. All compounds significantly inhibited invasion when employed individually. When C, P, and L were equally combined at the same gross dosage (4 microg/ml) as when the compounds were tested individually, a supradditive inhibition of invasion was observed, measured by the Kruskal-Wallis non-parametric test.

Possible synergistic prostate cancer suppression by anatomically discrete pomegranate fractions.

We investigated whether dissimilar biochemical fractions originating in anatomically discrete sections of the pomegranate (Punica granatum) fruit might act synergistically against proliferation, metastatic potential, and phosholipase A2 (PLA2) expression of human prostate cancer cells in vitro . Proliferation of DU 145 human prostate cancer cells was measured following treatment with a range of therapeutically active doses of fermented pomegranate juice polyphenols (W) and sub-therapeutic doses of either pomegranate pericarp (peel) polyphenols (P) or pomegranate seed oil (Oil). Invasion across Matrigel by PC-3 human prostate cancer cells was measured following treatment with combinations of W, P and Oil such that the total gross weight of pomegranate extract was held constant.

Pomegranate extracts potently suppress proliferation, xenograft growth, and invasion of human prostate cancer cells.

We completed a multicenter study of the effects of pomegranate cold-pressed (Oil) or supercritical CO(2)-extracted (S) seed oil, fermented juice polyphenols (W), and pericarp polyphenols (P) on human prostate cancer cell xenograft growth in vivo, and/or proliferation, cell cycle distribution, apoptosis, gene expression, and invasion across Matrigel, in vitro. Oil, W, and P each acutely inhibited in vitro proliferation of LNCaP, PC-3, and DU 145 human cancer cell lines. The dose of P required to inhibit cell proliferation of the prostate cancer cell line LNCaP by 50% (ED(50)) was 70 microg/mL, whereas normal prostate epithelial cells (hPrEC) were significantly less affected (ED(50) = 250 g/mL).

Differentiation-promoting activity of pomegranate (Punica granatum) fruit extracts in HL-60 human promyelocytic leukemia cells.

Differentiation refers to the ability of cancer cells to revert to their normal counterparts, and its induction represents an important noncytotoxic therapy for leukemia, and also breast, prostate, and other solid malignancies. Flavonoids are a group of differentiation-inducing chemicals with a potentially lower toxicology profile than retinoids. Flavonoid-rich polyphenol fractions from the pomegranate (Punica granatum) fruit exert anti-proliferative, anti-invasive, anti-eicosanoid, and pro-apoptotic actions in breast and prostate cancer cells and anti-angiogenic activities in vitro and in vivo.

Preliminary studies on the anti-angiogenic potential of pomegranate fractions in vitro and in vivo.

We previously showed pomegranate seed oil and fermented juice polyphenols to retard oxidation and prostaglandin synthesis, to inhibit breast cancer cell proliferation and invasion, and to promote breast cancer cell apoptosis. Here we evaluated the anti-angiogenic potential of these materials in several ways. We checked a possible effect on angiogenic regulation by measuring vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), interleukin-4 (IL-4) and migration inhibitory factor (MIF) in the conditioned media of estrogen sensitive (MCF-7) or estrogen resistant (MDA-MB-231) human breast cancer cells, or immortalized normal human breast epithelial cells (MCF-10A), grown in the presence or absence of pomegranate seed oil (SESCO) or fermented juice polyphenols (W).

Rapid dereplication of estrogenic compounds in pomegranate (Punica granatum) using on-line biochemical detection coupled to mass spectrometry.

During recent years, phytoestrogens have been receiving an increasing amount of interest, as several lines of evidence suggest a possible role in preventing a range of diseases, including the hormonally dependent cancers. In this context, various parts of the pomegranate fruit (Punica granatum; Punicaceae), e.g.