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The astragalus plant (Astragalus membranaceus) has been used in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) for thousands of years. It was often combined with other herbs to strengthen the body against disease. Astragaus is an adaptogen that defends our body from physical, mental, or emotional stress (1).

Astragalus is important in the aging process, and research suggests, has positive effects on tumors and cancer, according to Pubmed Central (4) and Oxford University Press.

Astragalus helps prevent tumor growth and protects against cell damage. Astragalus achieves this by reducing the aging of telomeres. Telomeres are structural “protective ends” of DNA. Telomere attrition during successive cell divisions induces chromosomal instability, and can lead to cancer. Cancer is generally an age-related genetic disease, manifesting only when normal cells accumulate genomic instability over a period of time, according to Biomed Central (3).

One study of 29 human colon cancer cells and tumor xenograft was undertaken by Quality Assurance Laboratory of the School of Chinese Medicine and Hong Kong Baptist University (6). The results showed that Astragalus saponins (AST) inhibit cell proliferation in part by inhibiting cyclin-dependent kinase activity, according to the research published by Oxford University Press (6).

Other sources say that Telomeres are a ribonucleoprotein complex responsible for progressive synthesis of telomeric DNA repeats (TTAGGG) (3). Telomerase counteracts the telomere shrinking process that delays, even reverses the cellular aging process (4) (5).

1. https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/astragalus-benefits

2. https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/astragalus

3. https://genomemedicine.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13073-016-0324-x

4. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21417995/#:~:text=Telomerase%20is%20the%20enzyme%20responsible,and%20stem%20and%20tumor%20cells

5. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telomerase

6. https://academic.oup.com/carcin/article/28/6/1347/2476243#