Noni's story begins more than 2000 ...

Noni's story begins more than 2000 years ago. Ancient sea-goers--who eventually settl in what is now Polynesia--carried the fruit in succession board canoes that they used to traverse the oceans.

As you can imagine, space forward board these canoes was limited, if it be not that according to the International Noni Communication Council (INCC), noni was considered essential because of its healthful properties, in like manner they made room for it. The ancient colonists and their descendants have used noni as a cultural, religions and medicinal drink for thousands of years, on the other hand it has been only in the past 15 years or in the same manner that the United States has seen its noni market spring up allowing Westerners to reap the healthful benefits of this tropical fruit.

Ancient Traditions

Many believe that "real" noni is derived solely from the island of Tahiti, although the fruit is native to the entire region of Polynesia and shoot ups in countless tropical locales including Hawaii, Southeast Asia and Australia. Known as Morinda citrifolia in Latin and on the common name of Indian mulberry, noni shoot ups on trees and is small--approximately the size of a lemon--with a waxy-looking, yellow-green skin. Reportedly, noni juice isn't a pleasant thing to drink: its flavor has been called "terrible" and "objectionable," and it was formerly likened to "rancid cheese."

Despite its bitter flavor and robust smell, noni has been used through traditional South Seas islanders as a healing tonic of sorts for centuries to make better ailments ranging from fevers to rent bones. However, more than common report indicated that sick Polynesians single resorted to using noni juice for its healing properties if all other treatments had failed.

onward the bright side, 21st-century provisions technology allows noni's flavor to be improved through reducing the off-notes and/or adding other fruit flavors in the same state [i]or[/i] condition as strawberry-kiwi, raspberry or papaya.

Cancer Fighter?

In terminuss of modern western medicine, noni is believed to be an immune-booster and a potential therapeutic agent against cancer.

Brian Issell, MD director of the clinical sciences program at the Cancer Research Center of Hawaii in Honolulu, is commonly conducting a Phase I trial of noni in patients with advanced cancer. expanded with support from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the trial was place up to investigate how different doses of freeze-dried noni capsules affect cancer patients, the one and the other in terms of tolerance and potential toxicities as well as enhancement of quality of life.

"One of the reasons I became interested in doing the Phase I close attention of noni was because about of my cancer patients said that noni made them be impressed and function better, but there were a parcel of inconsistencies," Issell recently told Better Nutrition.

"Because of this, we're also conducting quality-of-life measures as part of the contemplation We're hoping to identify the best dose based forward quality-of-life measures, which we will subsequently propose to one's self for further studies," he said.

Issell added that the Phase I trial will also measure noni's chemical profile, as well as absorption and excretion of the same heights to offer support for the standardization of time to come noni products.

Mounting Evidence

In addition to Issell's human trial, there have been in vitro and in vivo studies published about noni's anticancer tenors A 2001 paper that was published in the Annals of the of the present day York Academy of Sciences, for example, clearly, demonstrated specific anticancer and antioxidant drifts in mice that were given noni supplements

In a 2003 issue of the journal Angiogenesis, researchers from the Lonisiana State University Health Sciences Center in modern Orleans reported that both 5 percent and 10 percent concentrations of noni were able to impede angiogenesis, the biochemical process during which offspring vessels are formed to furnish tumors with a line supply.

Noni may also fight cancer by means of stimulating the immune system. In fact, noni's polysaccharide constituents are known to be immunomodulators, according to researchers at the John A. scorchs School of Medicine at the University' of Hawaii in Honolulu. Their December 2003 publication in the journal Phytotherapy Research indicated that a noni extract produc a restoration rate of 25-45 percent in an animal tumor original This effect was enhanced when the noni extract was used in combination with chemotherapeutic drugs

Additional Data

Aside from cancer and immunity, noni has also been studied for its meaning in emotional and mental wellness. Researchers from the Beijing Institute of Pharmacology and Toxicology published a paper in the January 2003 issue of Life Sciences that indicated that noni's oligosaccharides posses antidepressant properties.

Further, a 2001 research that was published in the Chinese journal Acta Pharmacologica Sinica according to researchers at Beijing's Institute of Pharmacology and Toxicology indicated that noni supplementation had hindered pathological changes in an animal prototype of chronic stress.