A New Cure to Cancer

MANILA, Philippines – Fourteen-year old Angeli Joyce Dy is not your typical teenager who whiles away her time shopping in malls. At 13, she’s pouring over thick science books and spending her summer at the laboratory of the University of the Philippines (UP) Institute of Biology, testing the anti-cancer, anti-bacterial properties from the bile of the milkfish (bangus).

Unlike most girls her age, Angeli, an incoming third year high school junior at the Capiz National High School, has been going back and forth to the regional office of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) in Capiz and SIFDEC library in Iloilo to make an in-depth and extensive research on her subject.

Angeli has stumbled upon an existing study on the potential anti-cancer properties of the milkfish bile and wanted to pursue this because in her own words “I want to help contribute in finding a cure to a widespread and global disease such as cancer.”

Her study recently took center stage when Angeli received the second special award from the American Association for Clinical Chemistry for her research project, “Cytotoxicity Against Human Lung (A549) and Colon (HCT116) Carcinomas, Antioxidant and Anti-Bacterial properties of Milkfish (Chanos chanos Forsskal) Bile” at the recently-concluded Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) in Reno, Nevada.