Kill cancer cells with broccoli and special probiotics

In Singapore, researchers in the NUS Medicine lab of Associate Professor Matthew Chang turned a cocktail of bacteria and vegetables into a targeted system that seeks out and kills colorectal cancer cells.

Using genetic techniques, the team engineered a harmless type of bacteria found in the gut into a probiotic that attached to the surface of colorectal cancer cells and secreted an enzyme to convert a substance found in vegetables like broccoli into a potent anticancer agent. The idea was for the cancer cells in the vicinity to take up this anticancer agent and be killed.  Normal cells cannot do this conversion, nor are they affected by the toxin, thus the system should be targeted only to colorectal cancer cells.

Researchers found that the mixture of engineered probiotics with a broccoli extract or water containing the dietary substance killed more than 95 percent of colorectal cancer cells in a dish.