Silver bullet for cancer: Metal can kill some tumours better than chemotherapy with fewer side effects

 

 

Silver can kill some cancers as effectively as chemotherapy and with potentially fewer side effects, new research claims.
Scientists say that old wives tales about the precious metal being a ‘silver bullet’ to beat the Big C could be true.
The metal already has a wide range of medicinal uses and is a common antiseptic, antibiotic and means of purifying water in the third world.

And British researchers now say that silver compounds are as effective at killing certain cancer cells as a leading chemotherapy drug, but with potentially far fewer side-effects.
They compared it to Cisplatin, currently used to treat a wide variety of cancers, but known to have harsh side effects including nausea, vomiting and even kidney damage.
Silver is used already in everyday products such as deodorant with no known side-effects, and could make for a potentially cheaper alternative to platinum-based Cisplatin.

Researchers from the University of Leeds conducted lab tests which exposed breast and colon cancer cells to various silver-based chemicals over a six day period.
Results, published in journal Dalton Transactions, showed that these silver-compounds were ‘as effective as Cisplatin’ at killing cancer with potentially fewer side effects.
While the team are still unsure about how exactly silver battles cancer, they think its effectiveness may be caused by the structure surrounding silver atoms, known as its ligand.

They think this may help release the silver ion into cells when it enters the body, killing any cancer.
Study author Dr Charlotte Willans plans to spend the next year looking closely at what effect silver has on both cancerous and healthy cells, and whether it could be a safe and effective new anti-cancer drug.
She said: 'It’s certainly an exciting discovery, although I think we have a lot of work to do in the future. It opens the doors in terms of what we can do and investigate.
'Getting these results also gives us the opportunity we need to apply for funding to take the research further.
'This could lead to a cheaper, less toxic alternative to current treatments for cancer.'
Explaining the research in greater detail, Dr Willans added: 'As many are unfortunately aware, chemotherapy can be a very gruelling experience for the patient.
'Finding effective, yet non-toxic drugs is an ongoing problem, but these preliminary results are an important step in solving it.
'Our research has looked at the structure which surrounds a central silver atom. This "shrubbery" is what determines how reactive it is and what it will interact with.
'Our research has used different types of these ligands to see which is the most effective against cancer cells.'

 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2095610/Silver-bullet-cancer-Metal-kill-tumours-better-chemotherapy-fewer-effects.html#ixzz1lRNqOxXk

Eastman Kodak says it bought $300 million of silver in 2011

Eastman Kodak Co. bought about $300 million of silver last year.
The price of silver was 199 percent to 294 percent higher than in 2008, Rochester, New York-based Kodak said in its Chapter 11 filing in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan. Silver is used in the company’s film, photofinishing and entertainment group. The $300 million equals 8.49 million ounces of the metal at last year’s average price of $35.32 an ounce.

Silver prices doubled in the past two years as more investors bought the metal to hedge against declines in the dollar and other assets and demand from other industrial applications climbed. The metal’s industrial uses include solar panels, plasma screens and chemical catalysts.
Global silver use in photographic film fell to 72.7 million ounces last year, the lowest amount since at least 1990, as consumers worldwide moved to digital technology, according to the Washington-based Silver Institute’s annual world silver survey by Thomson Reuters GFMS. Photography accounted for less than 10 percent of manufactured applications for silver in 2010 compared with 30 percent in 1990, it said.

http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20120119/business/701199886/

http://silver-metal-investment.blogspot.com/