MD Anderson Cancer Centre, USA is to sign a MoU with the All India Institute for Medical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi, soon. The centre plans to take up collaborative research with AIIMS and various developmental programmes in the areas of natural products, genomics, bioinformatics, tumour biomarkers and clinical trials with a strong intention to bring together physicians and scientists from both the sides. The centre also signed a MoU with Tata Cancer Research Institute, Mumbai, to work on similar areas. Dr Bharat Bhushan Aggarwal, professor of medicine, MD Anderson Cancer Centre, The University of Texas, Houston, USA told Pharmabiz.

He opined that India has good potential to develop natural product-based drugs. The country can prove to the world the strength of the combination of modern medicine and Ayurveda. US has a $10 billion market for natural products, which India can very well target. But, standardization and quality control aspects should be seriously taken. Since many died in US in the past using drugs based on natural products, they are skeptical of all natural products. FDA has banned several drugs, and is likely to come up with new regulations in this regard.

Most of the Indian pharma companies are looking at opportunities from off- patent drugs, with very few companies working on discovery research. However, in the future, companies would be forced to take up drug discovery for survival and growth, he added.

Curcumin, present in turmeric is helpful in checking the growth of cancerous tumours. It can be used to cure breast, colon, and pancreatic cancers. Besides cancer, it has beneficial effects on patients suffering from Alzheimer's disease and blood vessel related diseases. Curcumin works by suppressing the action of a nuclear transcription factor called NF-kB, which stimulates the growth of tumours in cancer patients. Clinical trials to find out the optimum dosage and frequency of administration of this turmeric extract is likely to be undertaken shortly at MD Anderson Cancer Centre. The National Institute of Health (NIH) of USA is proposing to fund the centre to take up clinical trails, and once funds are obtained, work would begin, Dr Bharat revealed.