It may sound like the stuff of science fiction, but new research has tapped incredible promise in a new, low-temperature "plasma blowtorch." This scene could soon be a reality for cancer patients. Keep reading for more. . .
The cold plasma blowtorch method
The blowtorch approach generates a beam of room-temperature plasma, safe enough to touch with your hand. A plasma is a sort of gas containing ionized or charged molecules. The plasma in this new treatment comes from nontoxic, room-temperature gases like helium, along with gases found in the air we breathe.To make the plasma, scientists force fast-moving electrons through the previously mentioned room-temperature gases. This sparks such a massive energy burst that the outer strings of electron bonds collide with the atoms and molecules inside the gases. The electrons and ions that are knocked free then form a non-bonded, "soupy" mixture. The energy required to break the electrons away from their atoms dispels quickly, so the gas ions stay cool.
The plasma is directed in a pencil-point beam that uses short pulses with high voltage to pump out a low-temperature plume. A blowtorch is one analogy. You could also describe it as a sort of plasma gun, or perhaps a fire hose. But I'm neither a techie nor an engineer, so take my comments accordingly.
The point is that it shoots out a directed stream of particles that wreck cancer cells.
Dr. Mounir Laroussie, who directs the Laser and Plasma Engineering Institute at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, along with his team, wanted to test the effects of this plasma mixture on cancers. They took aim at leukemia cells and got a double surprise.
The first surprise was that nothing happened to the cells right after the plasma treatment. They didn't react, and they certainly didn't die ... at first.
But about four hours later — and in some cases, as long as eight hours later — things started happening. The cancer cells began to die. But of equal importance was the fact that normal cells around them were unaffected.
Further testing showed compelling results: Over 90 percent of leukemia cells were obliterated after only 10 minutes of treatment with this cold plasma blowtorch.
Loroussie believes there's a biochemical reaction that takes place when cancer cells are shot with cold plasma, which is what prompts the cancer cells to self-destruct while healthy cells are left unharmed.
Why healthy cells stay protected
The secret ingredient in this procedure may come down to ozone, which is one of the key molecules in cold plasma.Ozone is a particularly reactive molecule with three oxygen atoms, as opposed to the two oxygen atoms found in the air we breathe. Ozone is increasingly useful in modern medicine. It's known to kill bacterial infections, which is important considering the increase we're seeing in drug-resistant bacteria.
As it turns out, ozone is a natural byproduct of a cell's metabolic cycle. And when you compare cancer cells to healthy cells, the cancer cells have much higher metabolisms. This naturally leads to elevated ozone levels.
So if you add extra ozone to the already-elevated ozone levels in cancer cells, it pushes those cancer cells to self-destruct in a frenzy of apoptosis. But, since healthy cells have lower levels of ozone to begin with, adding this additional ozone dose doesn't push them over the edge. They stay safe and unharmed.
That's the reason there's so much excitement behind this treatment. It's also why cold plasma treatment could be a major breakthrough for leukemia patients. Because even though leukemia patients often go on to lead healthy lives after overcoming cancer, they chronically suffer from the long-term side effects of interventions like chemotherapy, radiation, and bone marrow transplants. The side effects can include everything from hair loss to memory impairment to nerve damage.
Highway to cell death
Cold plasma treatment is getting a lot of attention, thanks to the findings described above. Researchers are hopeful it can be developed for other cancers, beyond leukemia. Research is already underway on how to properly dose skin, lung, and brain cancers with plasma treatments.Low-temperature plasma may also help with a host of other unmanageable diseases and drug-resistant bacterial infections. One hope is that it can be used to curb the plaques that prompt Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.
Of course, it's not widely available yet and has to jump through a bunch of regulatory hoops. Fortunately, it doesn't appear to have long-term side effects.
At the very least, it tells us we need to find out more about how plasma prompts cell death. The complexities of different cancers make it hard to come up with effective treatments. But if the cold plasma route is as effective as some researchers think it could be, all that's left is to work out specific doses for different types of cancers.
Meanwhile, it's the holidays, and we're wrecking our health with all the rich foods around us. . . or maybe not! A lot of foods you've been told to avoid are actually good for you. If you missed the news in our last issue, scroll down and read it below.
7 "Wicked" Foods the Food Police Have
Forbidden for 50 Years —
Eat All You Want — They're Good for You!
No need for that anymore. Now you can relax and enjoy, because numerous studies costing hundreds of millions of dollars have disproven a famous false claim that controls nearly everyone's eating habits -- and nearly every doctor's advice. Keep reading and let me set you free to eat these seven delicious foods.Continued below. . .
Show a Younger Face to the World
By repairing your skin's DNA, you can soften your skin and erase wrinkles, tighten up your sagging jaw line, make your crow's feet disappear, and banish sun and aging spots.This Nobel Prize winning secret makes it possible. Your "telomeres" determine how long your skin cells live. Telomeres are the "time keepers" attached to every strand of DNA. Each time your cells divide, your telomeres get shorter. The shorter your telomeres, the more your skin cells age… causing dry and wrinkled skin. Maintain the length of your telomeres, your skin will stay supple, radiant, and youthful.
Dr. Sears' Revive DNA Rejuvenation Cream turns back your skin's aging clock and helps you show a younger face to the world. Click here to find out more.
And let me add… since these seven foods are delicious — and they contribute so much to your health — why not enjoy them over the holidays and every day? Who cares what the "food police" say?
Do you still believe this myth?
A diet low in fat has now been linked with a dramatic reduction in wellness. Yes: The less fat you eat, the sicker you get.As for cholesterol, your doctor and the popular health press may have you in a tizzy about how it will kill you. Don't believe it…
The myth dates back to the cherry picking of results in a 1950s study. Dr. Ancel Keys hypothesized that fat intake and heart disease mortality were linked to each other. Americans, who had the highest rate of heart disease of any country, ate the most fat… while the Japanese ate the least fat and had the fewest heart attack deaths. So Dr. Keys pronounced that fatty foods caused heart disease.
But when the statistics were actually analyzed for all 22 countries in the study, the link between fat consumption and heart disease was not there. Yet it's been one of the sacred creeds of the medical profession for more than half a century.
In reality, fats and cholesterol are essential for life itself. They're precursors to your hormone production. In some cases, a low-fat diet and statin drugs can reduce your cholesterol level to the point where your health is in danger.
Saturated fats are essential for your metabolism and for cardiovascular health. I'll bet that's not what you've been hearing, though.
The most "wicked" food of all
The award for the most "villainous" food almost certainly goes to butter. After all, it's been reviled for over 50 years as the food most responsible for heart disease and high cholesterol. I can remember when TV was overrun with commercials telling people to switch from butter to margarine, to keep their cholesterol down.It was all based on bad science, but doctors and other nutritional illiterates continue to revile butter to this day.
Yet for thousands of years, people the world over treasured butter as a healthy food.
The first written reference to it was discovered on a 4500-year-old limestone tablet illustrating how to make it. In India, ghee (clarified butter) has been a symbol of purity and a worthy offering to the gods in religious ceremonies for 3000 years. The Bible references butter, when Abraham set butter and milk from a calf before three angels.
Back in 1900, heart disease was rare. But that was before Ancel Keys proclaimed that saturated fat and dietary cholesterol were to blame for heart disease…
Though it's now been proven a sham many times over, the image of butter as a killer still grips nearly everyone.
Fake butter is much more dangerous
The food industry developed margarine as an imposter to mimic butter, and propagandized it as a "health" food. Does it live up to its claims? Hardly!Margarine is a processed food, created chemically from refined oils through a process called hydrogenation. The oils are subjected to extremely high temperatures which cause rancidity. Deodorants are added to mask the horrible smell and food coloring is used to alter the grossly unappetizing grey color of the unfinished product.
These hydrogenated polyunsaturated oils are potentially much more detrimental to you than any saturated fat. Another lie, another dollar…
Contrary to Popular Belief, Butter Has Amazing Health Benefits
Believe it or not, studies show that those who consume butter are 50 percent LESS likely to develop heart disease than those who use margarine.Butter is a completely natural food essential to your health — especially high-quality organic butter.
The saturated fats in butter have strong anti-tumor and anti-cancer properties. Butter contains conjugated linoleic acid, which is a potent anti-cancer agent, muscle builder, and immune booster.
Butter is also rich in readily absorbed vitamin A — essential for thyroid and adrenal health. It's a terrific source of vitamins E and K which contribute to heart health.
Concerned about cholesterol? Butter is a natural non-soy source of lecithin, which aids cholesterol metabolism. And it contains an anti-stiffness factor that prevents hardening of the arteries.
The cholesterol in butterfat is essential to brain and nervous system development… and its arachidonic acid (AA) is vital to your brain, and cell membranes.
Its antioxidants protect against free radical damage that can lead to cancer, heart disease, and more. And butter is a rich source of the cancer-protective mineral selenium.
Its vitamin D contributes to healthy bones, its Activator X helps you absorb minerals, and its absorbable form of iodine is good for your thyroid.
Fats like those in butter help your body absorb the many healthy nutrients in veggies. So why not eat more veggies topped with butter?
The best butter is raw and organic, because pasteurization destroys valuable nutrients. But the sale of raw butter is prohibited in nearly every state. (If you can obtain raw milk and cream in your area, try your hand at making your own butter.)
Cultured butter is chock full of great bacteria like lactobacillus planterum and lactococcus lactis — microflora essential for a healthy digestive tract and immune system.
Give yourself permission to indulge in butter for your veggies, cooking, and whatever other healthy foods you want to enhance with its creamy goodness.
Butter's creamy cousin
You might guess that if butter is better for you than you ever expected, cream might also be, because butter comes from cream.Cream is dense in fat-soluble vitamins, conjugated linoleic acid, and even coenzyme Q10 (Co-Q10).
But here's the rub…
Fat soluble vitamins are fragile, delicate nutrients. So they're destroyed during the pasteurization process.
Cream is often pasteurized at ultra-high temperatures. The process denatures the fats and results in a dramatically different food than the nourishing one nature intended.
If you can get raw cream, it will contain beneficial bacteria and digestive enzymes. But you may have to settle for pasteurized organic cream, preferably vat-pasteurized at the lowest allowable temperatures.
Enjoy cream with a bowl of berries or on your low-sugar homemade pumpkin pie.
Start your day with this,
And you'll find you eat fewer calories
St. Louis University scientists discovered that those who eat eggs for breakfast eat fewer calories the rest of the day than those who eat bagels (which are a carbohydrate blowout.).
And you'll be happy to note that in a recent review of dozens of studies, Wake Forest University researchers found absolutely no link between egg consumption and heart disease. So you can toss out that myth too.
Eggs provide 20% of the RDA for choline, which you need for fat metabolism. But that's not choline's only benefit. It's a building block for the phospholipids used in all your cell's membranes, especially those in your brain and nerves. Choline is critical for good memory function, reduces breast cancer risk, maintains normal homocysteine levels, and lowers C-reactive protein (a marker for inflammation), tumor necrosis factor, and interleukin-6.
A recent study found that raw egg yolks contain the amino acids tryptophan and tyrosine, offering nearly twice the antioxidants found in an apple. (When cooked, the antioxidants drop in half.)
What kind of eggs should you buy?
Pasture-raised, organic, free-grazing hens produce a superior quality egg.
Perhaps even more importantly, salmonella testing revealed a whopping 5 times higher salmonella incidence with "regular" caged hens(23.4 percent of farms), versus organic flocks (4.4 percent).
This is an especially critical consideration if you consume your eggs raw — as in smoothies or homemade holiday eggnog.
Pass the guacamole, please!
The avocado has fared better in the press in recent years than butter, cream or eggs. But some people still shun it for its fat content — when really, the biggest danger may be in what you pair it with.Avocados provide all 18 essential amino acids for a complete protein. They are readily absorbed. And they boost HDL ("good" cholesterol) -- while at the same time they reduce LDL ("bad" cholesterol) just as effectively as statin drugs. What's not to like?
Avocados are one powerful health food. We wrote about them in Issue 195, and you may want to check it out if you missed it.
Make your own guacamole at home to avoid unhealthy food additives — or just to avoid avocados that aren't organic. It’s one of my favorite treats. It's easy to make and only takes a couple minutes of chopping two or three ingredients.
For best nutritional value, eat it like a salad, and stay away from combining it with chips — with their potentially dangerous GMO ingredients, trans-fatty acids (those really ARE the fats to avoid), and negligible nutrition. Try it as a dip for veggies or as a sauce on eggs or chicken instead.
Be careful when eating this popular fat
Almost everyone is thrilled when they learn that chocolate can be a healthy fat. The operative word here is "can". You may sense a "but" is about to follow, and you're right. There are almost too many warnings about chocolate to mention in the space we have here. So I'll stick to the most important ones.If you want to reap its health benefits, your chocolate should be dark, dark, dark… as well as low in sugar and free of soy products and other additives.
That will narrow the playing field quite a bit. But remember… picky eating wins out over dying sooner than you have to. If you're careful about your choice of chocolate, you can reap substantial health benefits.
Chocolate may lower your risk of stroke (by 20 percent), your blood pressure, your "bad" LDL cholesterol, and your risk of heart disease, thanks to its inflammation-fighting properties. It may boost insulin sensitivity, lowering your risk of diabetes and cancer.
Cocoa has anti-clotting, blood-thinning properties that can improve circulation. It can boost blood flow to your brain and help you feel more awake and alert. It can even help you perform better on mental tasks.
And there's no denying that indulging in chocolate feels good.
Here's another saturated fat that's good for you
Coconut oil contains even more saturated fat than butter. Even better, more than 50 percent of it is lauric acid. Lauric acid helps you in a surprising way. Although it raises LDL (bad) cholesterol, it boosts HDL (good) cholesterol even more, so the result is a net decreased risk of cardiovascular disease.Lauric acid is anti-bacterial, anti-microbial, anti-viral (perfect for fighting a cold) and anti-inflammatory.
It contains a long list of vitamins and minerals, is used in infant formula and as a treatment for malnutrition...
One Florida doctor claims she reversed her husband's Alzheimer's disease just by giving him 4 teaspoons of coconut oil per day… allowing him to resume his normal life and completely halting his brain atrophy within one year. You can read their story in our book Awakening from Alzheimer's — along with 8 other proven, doctor-endorsed ways to cure this dreaded disease.
Coconut oil works well for cooking and baking, because heat doesn't break down its benefits. You can also add it to smoothies or take it as a supplement. I personally use it for nearly all my cooking. It's as rich and tasty as butter. For more information about coconut oil, see Issue 126.
Nuts about nuts… and still healthy
Nuts are another healthy food that some people avoid because it's high in fat. More bad, dangerous misinformation.Nuts are delicious, convenient, easy to travel with, and have a long shelf life, making them great for holiday travel, or any travel. I keep a variety of raw, organic nuts at my house, and I can't tell you how many times they've gotten me out of a bind because I was hungry, but too busy to cook.
Different kinds of nuts have varying nutrients. Most of them are high in omega-3 fatty acids and vitamin E.
Raw nuts, or better yet, sprouted raw nuts, retain most of their original nutrients intact.
But don't expect to see the raw sprouted variety at a holiday event — that'd be a rarity. However, even dry roasted nuts are undoubtedly a better option than the sugar-laced foods that usually grace holiday tables. They won't spike your blood sugar out of orbit, and you may still get more nutrients than any of your other party options.
How much fat do you need for good health?
Although the U.S. government is proud to claim that saturated fats should be less than 10 percent of your total diet, new evidence continues to support much greater amounts of fat. Some experts now advise 50 to 70 percent. That's a shocking figure, but it's what some people are saying.Personally, I eat a high-fat diet and I have a healthy weight with no tendency to put on more. And I stuff myself with yummy treats like guacamole, eggs and nuts. I eat a great deal of coconut oil — it's my primary cooking oil. And it tastes great. I don't go too heavy on butter — I think coconut oil is healthier for cooking, and cashew butter or almond butter (similar to peanut butter, but healthier) are just as good on bread. But if you're eating margarine, you'd be much better off switching to real butter.
There's no small amount of evidence that the FDA's recommendations are riddled with conflicts of interest. The doctors and scientists profit handsomely from the foods and drugs they tell you are "healthy." It's a disgrace that they still propagate the cholesterol myth, urge people to take statin drugs, and command patients to eat a low-fat diet.
It's best not to use the FDA and the mainstream medical profession as your primary source of information on food.
Carbs, especially sugar, are the devil — NOT fats. The science is in, and it's not fats that make you fat and expose you to heart disease, cancer and diabetes. It's carbohydrates.
That's a big reason the whole low-fat craze has been such an unmitigated health disaster.
Saturated fats are extremely filling and satisfying, so you eat less junk. If you do get hungry between meals, why not grab a handful of healthy nuts or half an avocado? They're sure to keep you going till the next meal.
Most of all, feel free to treat yourself to some healthy fats over the holidays… now that you can leave the guilt behind.
Kindest regards,
Lee Euler, PublisherReferences from 1st article:"Dose-dependent killing of leukemia cells by low-temperature plasma." N Barekzi and M Laroussi. Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics, Vol 45, Num 42.http://iopscience.iop.org/0022-3727/45/42/422002"Childhood Blood Cancers: Leukemia Incidence." Leukemia & Lymphoma Society: Disease Information & Support.http://www.lls.org/diseaseinformation/getinformationsupport/factsstatistics/
childhoodbloodcancers/"Leukemia-Killing Plasma Beam Could Offer New Cancer Treatments." By Halleh B. Balch, Inside Science News Service Contributor. 29 Nov 2012.http://www.insidescience.org/content/leukemia-killing-plasma-beam-could-offer-new-cancer-treatments/859"Managing Chemotherapy Side Effects." National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes of Health.http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/coping/chemo-side-effects"Targeting the cancer cell cycle by cold atmospheric plasma." By O. Volotskova, et al. Scientific Reports 2, Article number 636. Pub 6 Sept 2012.http://www.nature.com/srep/2012/120906/srep00636/full/srep00636.html
childhoodbloodcancers/"Leukemia-Killing Plasma Beam Could Offer New Cancer Treatments." By Halleh B. Balch, Inside Science News Service Contributor. 29 Nov 2012.http://www.insidescience.org/content/leukemia-killing-plasma-beam-could-offer-new-cancer-treatments/859"Managing Chemotherapy Side Effects." National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes of Health.http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/coping/chemo-side-effects"Targeting the cancer cell cycle by cold atmospheric plasma." By O. Volotskova, et al. Scientific Reports 2, Article number 636. Pub 6 Sept 2012.http://www.nature.com/srep/2012/120906/srep00636/full/srep00636.html
