NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - A popular Chinese herb was able to ward off the development of cancerous abnormalities in laboratory animals, a team of chemists report.

``This was a new activity associated with a known compound,'' lead author Dr. A. Douglas Kinghorn, a professor in the department of pharmacy at the University of Illinois at Chicago, told Reuters Health. ``This was an unusual result we were not expecting.''

The herb, Brucea javanica, or Ya Dan Zi, is commonly used in traditional Chinese medicine to treat a variety of ailments, including fevers, dysentery and warts, Kinghorn said.

The research was presented at the American Chemical Society meeting here last week and funded by the National Cancer Institute. It is part of the university's Natural Inhibitors of Carcinogenesis Project, which attempts to find chemicals in plants that have cancer-preventative properties.

The researchers broke the herb down into 11 unique components. One of those components, called flazin, was able to inhibit the development of cancerous abnormalities in the breast cells of mice.

Flazin has previously been reported to be present in soy sauce, Kinghorn noted.

Although the researchers do not plan to pursue this specific compound, Kinghorn said it would be reasonable to test flazin further on its ability to ward off other cancer growths such as skin cancer.

``We were happy this worked so potently,'' Kinghorn said. ``We feel this would be a reasonable lead for others to pursue.''

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