The Pacific Yew Tree
(Taxus brevifolia) is a tree native to America’s
Pacific Northwest. From the bark of the Pacific yew
tree, the drug paclitaxel, a taxane chemotherapy drug,
is extracted. Paclitaxel has shown effectiveness not
just in prostate cancer but ovarian cancer and breast
cancer as well. Paclitaxel has a complex chemical structure
that is not easily synthesized. Since the discovery
of the tree’s anticancer properties, the pacific
yew tree has been heavily harvested. To treat one prostate
cancer patient, six one-hundred-year-old trees are needed.
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