Researchers have identified a new form of ecstasy that kills blood cancer cells in a test-tube within 24 hours. When the drug attaches to the cancer it causes the cells to self-destruct. Its a clean way to destroying the cancer. The cells kill themselves and all the bad parts are naturally removed, so there are less side-effects compared to chemotherapy. Researchers identified a version of the ecstasy drug that is 100 times more powerful than the recreational version. The work is published in Investigational New Drugs.
Preliminary work suggests the new modified drug causes fewer nasty side-effects which ecstasy-users experience, including neurotoxicity. The link between ecstasy and cancer was discovered more than six years ago, when Researchers group saw the blood cancers were making very similar chemicals to the ones ecstasy targets in the brain. The new version of the drug they have created is extremely efficient at attacking the cancer. Read more…
