Indena Hosts Symposium on Anti-Cancer Plants

BARI, Italy—Indena (www.indena.com) hosted a symposium on the anticancer properties of edible plants (including green tea, soy and Curcuma longa) at the 48° Annual Meeting of the Italian Cancer Society. “Given that 40 percent of anticancer drugs discovered over the last 60 years are botanicals or a botanical derivative, the importance of plants in cancer therapy can today be taken for granted,” explained Paolo Morazzoni, Indena’s scientific director. “Oncology research is increasingly heading towards prevention and finding exciting responses in nature.”

In addition to Morazzoni, two prominent researchers, Prof. A. Gescher of Leicester University, England, and A. Albini from the National Tumor Institute of Genoa, Italy, took part in the seminar entitled “Edible plants against cancer: state of the art and future perspectives.” The scientists spoke on their work on the development of natural occurring agents as chemopreventive drugs and how plant-derived molecules act on angiogenesis.