Milk thistle extract is one of the most commonly used nontraditional therapies, particularly in Germany. Milk thistle is known to contain a number of flavonolignans. We evaluated the effect of silymarin, on the activity of various hepatic drug-metabolizing enzymes in human hepatocyte cultures. Treatment with silymarin (0.1 and 0.25 mM) significantly reduced the activity of CYP3A4 enzyme (by 50 ...

The American Association for Cancer Research has been the citadel for communicating research on chemical carcinogens for over a century. It therefore seems appropriate that a review of chemical carcinogenesis inaugurates a series of articles highlighting advances in understanding, treating, and preventing cancer. At the dawn of the 20th century, we had recognized that chemicals cause cancer, bu...

UDP-glucuronosyltransferase 1A10 (UGT1A10) is an extrahepatic enzyme expressed in aerodigestive tract tissues that exhibits significant glucuronidation activity against the important procarcinogenic benzo(a)pyrene (BaP) metabolite, BaP-trans-7,8-dihydrodiol (BPD), and the UGT1A10 codon 139 (Glu>Lys) polymorphism was previously implicated in risk for orolaryngeal cancer by Elahi et al. in their ...