Cancer cells have a method of expelling drugs intended to kill them. Cancer cells use glutathione to detoxify doxorubicin, a drug used for chemotherapy, and escort the drug out of the cells. Along with being one of the things cancer cells use against drugs and chemicals, glutathione is one the liver’s first-line of defense against drugs and chemicals. For several years, researchers in Japan have been experimenting with an amino acid from tea, theanine, …showed first 75 words of 277 total…

…showed last 75 words of 277 total…reverses lipid peroxidation in cardiac tissue which doxorubicin causes to double. Theanine is structurally similar to glutamate so it is able to fool cancer cells into let it in, but once inside it is mistakenly used to create glutathione. Yet the gluthathione they create with theanine does not detoxify like natural glutathione. Instead, this theanine-based glutathione appears to block the ability of cancer cells to detoxify. Theanine may be an ideal partner for doxorubicin chemotherapy.