The Mediterranean diet is one of the healthiest diets in the world and has been linked to low rates of all sorts of chronic illness. A key ingredient in this diet is Olive oil, which is the key player in this new body of research related to cancer.

Current research at Rutgers University has focused on Olive. For years now, researchers have suspected that an ingredient in olive oil called oleocanthal has the capability to kill cancer cells. This has been suspected for years now, but not understand until more recently.

An exciting part of the research is that this compound in Olive, may kill cancer cells but leave healthy cells alive. This process may be related to the idea that the oleocanthal can target a protein found on cancer cells that triggers their cell death (apoptosis).

A team of researchers has now been on this task to understand this process and have found a few interesting things.

First, the researchers were surprised how quickly the oleocanthal destroyed the cancer cells. Generally speaking 'apoptosis' can take an entire day, but with the addition of oleocanthal, this was increased to just under 1 hour. What researchers found was that the oleocanthal was able to penetrate through the cancer cell's vesicles (where the cell waste is stored), and when they punctured these 'waste areas' the body created an influx of enzyme production to make the cell die quicker.

What about the healthy cells? Well after careful watching, the researchers noted that, although immediately the healthy cells saw a pause in their life cycles, all healthy cells were normal after 24 hours.

So far this research has only been conducted in test tubes, but such promising research precludes more testing in animal models. For the time being, be sure to buy cold pressed, extra virgin olive oil from a high quality source to ensure you are getting the best health benefits that you can.

To read more about this interesting research visit the link below to the original research.