Tea and coffee found to activate cancer gene
A chemical study found that tea, coffee and certain other plant-based foods seem to activate a gene associated with cancer. Researchers at John Hopkins Medicine discovered that green and black teas, coffee, bread crusts, cocoa powder and liquid smoke might cause DNA damage equivalent to chemotherapy drugs. They focused on a gene called p53, which is activated when DNA damage occurs, and found that those ingredients increased the activity of p53 30-fold. While scientists are unsure what causes these effects, they suspect that plants contain compounds that are meant to deter humans and animals from eating them, like cellulose in stems and bitter-tasting tannins in leaves and beans.