US researchers have discovered that capsaicin found in hot chilly peppers can cause human cancer cells to kill themselves. This new finding may pave the way for a new treatmetn for the prostate cancer disease.(file photo)

BEIJING,March 16 (Xinhuanet) -- A natural chemical found in hot peppers may someday become a cure in treating prostate cancer, according to a new study published yesterday in the US journal Cancer Research.   

The chemical is called capsaicin, a stubstance in peppers that causes the tongue to burn, eyes to water and sweat to pour out.   

Researchers, working in the Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute at Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre, Los Angeles, have now found that capsaicin can also cause human prostate cancer cells to kill themselves by making the cells undergo programmed cell death or apoptosis.   

The finding is based on lab tests on mice. Researchers found that capsaicin induced approximately 80 percent of cancer cells growing in mice to follow the molecular pathways leading to apoptosis.

Prostate cancer tumours treated with capsaicin were about one-fifth the size of tumours in non-treated mice.

Meanwhile, the UK Prostate Cancer Charity said a capsaicin drug was a future possibility to combat prostate cancer, which kills 10,000 British men a year in the UK.

But it advised patients NOT to start eating more chillies because excess intake of peppers could cause stomach cancer.