Hope for skin cancer patients from bananas

Black spots on banana peels can help make it quicker and easier to diagnose skin cancer patients, thereby increasing their survival.

When ripe bananas, black spots appear on the crust due to the enzyme called tyrosinase . Similar enzymes are also found on human skin, especially in skin cancer patients. According to Angewandte Chemie (Germany), a group of researchers from the Laboratory of Physics and Electrochemical Analysis in Sweden concluded that tyrosinase is a reliable sign of tumor growth.

Scientists believe that bananas will give hope to people with skin cancer.(Photo: AFP).

In the early stages of cancer, the amount of tyrosinase is negligible. By the second stage, they gradually increase, evenly distributed throughout the body. Finally, when the cancer spreads to other parts of stage 3, this enzyme is concentrated in certain areas.

The sooner the diagnosis is made, the more likely the cancer patient will survive. The American Cancer Society recognizes that one person will have a 95% chance of surviving another 10 years if he is diagnosed with an early stage disease. This number drops to 43% if cancer is not determined before stage 3.

Scientists are developing a type of scanner and testing it on dark spots of bananas before applying them on humans. "This method can avoid the use of invasive tests like biopsies," the scientists said. Lead researcher Hubert Girault also hopes the scanner will allow the tumor to be destroyed without chemotherapy.