Cancer Watch: Curcumin (Curry) and Cancer Cells

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(Link to this article: http://raffysaldana.blogspot.com/2009/09/cancer-watch-curcumin-curry-and-cancer.html)


One of my research interests is Cancer dynamics. I have done (and still doing) research on cancer informatics (including modeling and simulation) together with my students at Ateneo de Manila University.

Today (9/19/09), I read an article by Ms. Tessa Salazar in the Philippine Daily Inquirer titled, " ‘Luyang dilaw’ kills tumor cells—scientists. " In English, "luyang dilaw" literally means "yellow ginger" and in scientific lingo it is known by the name "Curcuma longa Linn" .

Yellow ginger contains "curcumin" or "turmeric" or "curry" -- an ingredient used in many Indian dishes.

Below is the link to the article:

http://showbizandstyle.inquirer.net/lifestyle/lifestyle/view/20090918-225860/Luyang-dilaw-kills-tumor-cellsscientists

The Inquirer article mentioned that curcumin has anti-inflammatory capability.

I also learned from the Inquirer article that in a recent study published at the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists journal titled “Curcumin and Cancer Cells: How Many Ways Can Curry Kill Tumor Cells Selectively?” by Jayaraj Ravindran, Sahdeo Prasad and Bharat B. Aggarwal, curcumin was shown to have “killed” tumor cells.

The abstract of the paper by Ravindran et al. stated: “We show that curcumin modulates growth of tumor cells through regulation of multiple cell signaling pathways including cell proliferation pathway (cyclin D1, c-myc), cell survival pathway (Bcl-2, Bcl-xL, cFLIP, XIAP, c-IAP1), caspase activation pathway (caspase-8, 3, 9), tumor suppressor pathway (p53, p21), death receptor pathway (DR4, DR5), mitochondrial pathways and protein kinase pathway (JNK, Akt and AMPK).”

According to Ms. Salazar, the study described, in detail, how curcumin selectively kills tumor cells, and leaves normal cells untouched.

As a modeler, I am interested to investigate the biophysics and/or systems biology of this phenomenon and to come up with a mathematical or computational model that can be used for simulations.

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Raffy Saldaña
9/19/09

Visit to the Cancer Center of Medical City Hospital

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Gerald Divinagracia (MS Information Technology student) giving a presentation of his thesis proposal.

Andrei Coronel (Ph.D. Computer Science student) discusses with Dr. Trixie Jayme-Tiangco some aspects of breast cancer ontology.

Dr. Trixie Jayme-Tiangco (oncologist) and Dr. Raffy Saldaña (applied mathematician and computational scientist)

Group picture with Dr. Trixie Jayme-Tiangco, oncologist, Cancer Center, Medical City Hospital, Pasig City

Last Thursday, 11 September 2008, my cancer informatics research students (BS AMC, BS CS, BS ECE, MS IT, and PhD CS) and I visited the Cancer Center of the Medical City Hospital (the affiliate hospital of Ateneo de Manila University) in Ortigas Avenue, Pasig City, Metro Manila.

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We met with Dr. Trixie Jayme-Tiangco, one of the oncologists (cancer specialists) of Medical City Hospital. (Note: Trixie and I were schoolmates in Philippine Science High School -- Trixie belongs to Batch '79 while I belong to Batch '77).

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My students (undegraduate, masters' and Ph.D. level) presented their research problems to Dr. Trixie Jayme-Tiangco.

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Thank you very much Dr. Trixie Jayme-Tiangco for your valuable inputs. Our cancer informatics research group appreciate very much your generosity in spending time with us at the Cancer Center of Medical City.

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Click on the following link to see more photos (Suggestion: Choose the Slideshow Option):

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http://booleanlogic.multiply.com/photos/album/161/Visit_to_the_Cancer_Center_of_Medical_City_Ortigas_Pasig_City

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Cheers,

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Raffy Saldaña

Invitation: Computational and Informatics Aspects of Cancer (Colloquium/Seminar Series)

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TO ALL INTERESTED Science and Engineering faculty and students of Ateneo de Manila University:

Greetings.

I would like to invite you to paticipate in an interdisciplinary colloqium/seminar series on "Computational and Informatics Aspects of Cancer."

The colloquium/seminar series is scheduled every Monday, 4:30 - 5:30 p.m. in SEC 303A during the first semester of SY 2008-2009.

The aim of this colloquium/seminar series is to develop an interdisciplinary research group in the School of Science and Engineering that will include the following computational and informatics aspects of cancer research: algorithms, databases, data mining, computer aided diagnosis, e-learning, expert systems, modeling & simulation, ontology, applied mathematics, bioinformatics, computational biophysics, systems biology, visualization, high performance computing and Grid technology applications.

At present the group consists of some undergraduate & graduate students and faculty members under the following departments: Mathematics; Information Systems and Computer Science (DISCS); and Electronics, Commmunications, and Computer Engineering (ECCE). The group also aims to pursue collaboration with other disciplines and with medical practitioners in the Medical City Cancer Center and other cancer institutes.

Current research projects involved in the group are as follows:

1. Ontology for breast cancer
2. Developing an expert system for breast cancer risk analysis
3. Data mining algorithms for breast cancer diagnosis
4. Content-based image retrieval (CBIR) of digital mammograms using Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI)
5. Modeling and simulation of tumor growth using cellular automata
6. Grid-based retrieval and analysis of digital mammograms.

The group is linked with two international projects including:

1. ONCO-MEDIA project (http://www.onco-media.com/) (funded by the French government's ICT-Asia regional program)

2. EUAsiaGrid project (http://www.euasiagrid.org/) (funded by the European Commission FP7 program)

The group will also utilize the Medgrid/Agila high performance computing cluster facility of the School of Science and Engineering.

I would also like to invite experts among you who are interested to provide inputs in the cellular, biochemical, medical, environmental and othe aspects of cancer research. Science and engineering students who are looking for thesis topics in the field of biomedical computing and informatics are also welcome to attend the colloquium/seminar series.

Thank you.

Rafael P. Saldaña, Ph.D.
Convenor
Ateneo Cancer Informatics Research Group (ATCG)
& Ateneo Grid and High-Performance Computing Group (A-GRID)
E-mail: raffysaldana@gmail.com
Blog: http://raffysaldana.blogspot.com/
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