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Herbal Compound Helps Reduce Tumor Cells in Mice

Research assistant Katie McCullough holds up a mouse for Jake Litvag, 16, to see inside a Washington University lab (AP)
Research assistant Katie McCullough holds up a mouse for Jake Litvag, 16, to see inside a Washington University lab (AP)
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Herbal Compound Helps Reduce Tumor Cells in Mice

Research assistant Katie McCullough holds up a mouse for Jake Litvag, 16, to see inside a Washington University lab (AP)
Research assistant Katie McCullough holds up a mouse for Jake Litvag, 16, to see inside a Washington University lab (AP)

The active compound in Chinese herbs called emodin, also found in some fruits and vegetables, can reduce colon cancer cells in mice, according to researchers at the University of South Carolina School of Medicine.

Physiologists conducting this study involving mice say this is likely due to emodin's ability to reduce the number of pro-tumor macrophages (a type of immune cell that can promote tumorigenesis). The new study was published by the American Physical Society (APS) ahead of print in the American Journal of Physiology-Gastrointestinal and Liver Physiology.

The researchers studied two groups of mice, one of them was treated with emodin. The results showed that mice treated with emodin "exhibited lower protumorigenic M2-like macrophages in the colon."

The team hope their findings could be used soon in human therapeutics.

Colon cancer is the third most common cancer in men and women, and the third leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the US, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is expected to cause more than 52,000 deaths in the US in 2022.

According to the American Cancer Society, colon cancer risk factors include obesity, physical inactivity, diets high in red meat, smoking, and alcohol use.

“Approximately 70% of colon cancer cases can be attributed to diet or other lifestyle factors. This study raises hope that daily consumption of fresh fruits and vegetables containing emodin could prevent colon cancer in humans,” said Angela Murphy, co-author of the study from the department of pathology, microbiology, and immunology at the University of South Carolina School of Medicine.

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$344 for a Coffee? Scottish Farm is Selling UK's Most Expensive Cup

This undated handout photo shows farmer and owner of Mossgiel Organic Farm Bryce Cunningham, right, giving a bottle of milk to barista Jacob Smith, as they pose outside The Good Coffee Cartel in Glasgow, Scotland. (Mossgiel Organic Dairy via AP)
This undated handout photo shows farmer and owner of Mossgiel Organic Farm Bryce Cunningham, right, giving a bottle of milk to barista Jacob Smith, as they pose outside The Good Coffee Cartel in Glasgow, Scotland. (Mossgiel Organic Dairy via AP)
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$344 for a Coffee? Scottish Farm is Selling UK's Most Expensive Cup

This undated handout photo shows farmer and owner of Mossgiel Organic Farm Bryce Cunningham, right, giving a bottle of milk to barista Jacob Smith, as they pose outside The Good Coffee Cartel in Glasgow, Scotland. (Mossgiel Organic Dairy via AP)
This undated handout photo shows farmer and owner of Mossgiel Organic Farm Bryce Cunningham, right, giving a bottle of milk to barista Jacob Smith, as they pose outside The Good Coffee Cartel in Glasgow, Scotland. (Mossgiel Organic Dairy via AP)

It's an enormous price to pay for a little cup of coffee, but the man behind the pitch promises it won't leave a bitter taste behind as it comes with the sweetner of a share of a dairy farm.
A Scottish dairy is offering what it bills as the UK's most expensive cup o' joe: 272 British pounds ($344) for a flat white — a double shot of espresso topped with a layer of steamed milk and a fleeting work of foam art, The Associated Press reported.
The costly cup is actually a perk for purchasing shares in Mossgiel Organic Dairy's crowdfunding campaign to enlarge its sustainable operation and produce more milk. Investors who buy 34 shares in the farm get a certificate for a flat white that can be redeemed starting this weekend at one of 13 coffee shops in Scotland that use the dairy's milk.
“This coffee costs nearly 80 times the price of an average flat white in the UK — but it’s much more than just a lovely drink,” said owner Bryce Cunningham. "We know it sounds crazy, but when you break it down, it’s a pretty good deal. How much is the future of farming worth?”
The price tops the eye-watering 265 pounds that Shot London, a coffee bar in the posh Mayfair and Marylebone neighborhoods, charged for a flat white made with rare beans from Okinawa, Japan. The Telegraph reported in April that it was the most expensive coffee in Britain.
Before launching the coffee promotion, Cunningham had already raised more than a third of the 300,000 pounds he is seeking from small investors as he tries to get a 900,000 pound loan that will help him double operations and expand out of Scotland and as far as coffee shops in London.
Shareholders receive other rewards, too, such farm tours, milk delivery discounts and invites to special events. But investors are also given a standard warning that they could lose some or all of the money they invest — except for the coffee.
The tenant farm in Mauchline, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) south of Glasgow, was worked in the 18th century by poet Robert Burns, who penned “Auld Lang Syne" and many other well-known works. Burns, who is considered the national poet of Scotland, wrote while working in the fields there for two years and his face graces each glass bottle of Mossgiel milk.
Cunningham, a former service manager for Mercedes-Benz, took over the operation in 2014 after his father and grandfather died in 2014 from terminal illnesses.
The collapse of milk prices that year and other problems forced him to sell off most of the herd and reinvent the business as an organic farm. He uses a process to “brew” the milk, instead of pasteurize it, that he said gives it the creamer taste and texture of raw milk without the health risks.
Todd Whiteford, one of the owners of The Good Coffee Cartel in Glasgow that is serving the costly cups, said they’ve been using Mossgiel's milk for several years. Despite “outrageous offers" from competitors to switch, he said other milk producers can't match the quality and consistency that makes for “rounder, smoother and sweeter” cappuccinos, lattes and flat whites — and better coffee art.
“Theirs is the best. I’ll argue with anyone about that,” Whiteford said.
Anyone who splashes out to buy a Mossgiel coffee, though, will be getting the same cup other Coffee Cartel customers can purchase for 3.10 pounds. But Cunningham says there will be a taste of virtue with every posh cup.