7 replies to this topic

[thed00dabides]

Hey guys, stumbled across this article whilst researching the effects of smoking tulsi basil for its eugenol effects..

http://myspringhillgarden.com/?p=622

It's quite crazy how the age of this common herb can determine its carcinogenic properties, rule is grow your plants large to avoid the methyleugonol

Edited by thed00dabides, 13 May 2013 - 09:02 PM.

[Auxin]

Good to know

[simhanada]

Yeah, thanks.  I will have to wait till my basil gets a bit bigger.

[Amazonian]

I am  was a fan of pesto too...eeeek.  I will be making my own from mature plant material i guess.

 

I wonder what other herbs can be nasty if eaten before they mature?

[ferret]

just reading a different paper analysing leaves of small plants, found younger leaves had fairly low levels of methyl eugenol.

 

(percentages from basal leaves (22% methyleugenol) to folded tip leaves(0.36))

 

Methyl eugenol 22.17 12.20 5.50 2.40 1.20 0.36

1,8-cineole 22.20 22.40 22.10 22.00 19.10 21.80 
Linalool 6.25 11.05 17.53 21.24 21.45 24.01 

Eugenol 5.51 8.68 10.12 11.28 10.41 13.33

 
 

also if anyone can find any Rf values for TLC'ing methyl eugenol for that would be ace

[Torsten]

Piling bad science on top of bad science is still bad science.

 

The carcinogenicity of allylbenzenes [incl methyleugenol] is based on the carcinogenic effect of safrole observed in rodents. This happens via the 1-hydroxy metabolite. Problem is that quite a few years ago it becamse obvious that humans lacked the enzyme that caused this transformation. In desperation to try and keep safrole restricted some human livercell experiments were doen that showed that 1-hydroxylation in humans was possible at certain concentrations. These concentratiosn were so high as to be completely irrelevant. ie unless you drink a small bottle of safrole per day you will not get the 1-hydroxyl metabolites. The proof of concept at these high doses however allowed for all the ridiculous safrole restrictions to remain in place. Interestingly the same metabolite issues exist for the other allylbenzenes, like myristicin which is unrestricted in foods [it is present in parsley and nutmeg as well as being an ingredient in coca cola].

 

So all these years later we're still getting the same ridiculous warnings. The article refers to cell damage from 3ug/day in 'mammals', which  seems to be correct for rodents, but in a comparison study it took at least 150-300mg/kg to induce problems in human liver cells. That is 50,000 to 100,000 times as much! That's equivalent to eating 500kg of pesto per day. Still concerned?

[raketemensch]

Yep, but more about the difficulty of distinguishing 'good' from 'bad' research than about pesto: http://www.plosmedic...al.pmed.0020124

[thed00dabides]

Thanks for clearing that up T

D00d