Project ʻOlonā - Nīoi (The Hawaiian Chili Pepper)


For my last blog post, I want to talk about a plant that I've worked with for a very long time! I am part of a research group at KCC called Project ʻOlonā and for three years I've focused on Nīoi, or also known as the Hawaiian chili pepper. Our focus was to bridge Hawaiian traditional knowledge of medicine with modern science. With the use of modern day science and technology, we can look at how these plants helped medicinally and verify what our ancestors knew. 

 Nīoi (Capsicum frutescens) is a chili pepper that was introduced to Hawaiʻi and became naturalized to the islands. Kahuna lāʻau lapaʻau (traditional Hawaiian health practitioners) used nīoi to treat arthritis, rheumatism, toothaches, to clear their sinuses, and other health issues. Practitioners would use nīoi with other ingredients to make their remedies. 

My project in a nutshell!
Just to make it easier to read, I'll list out what I did and what I've concluded.
  1. Grew nīoi in hydroponics and in soil to see which medium it grew best in ----> Hydroponics works the best!
  2. Harvested the chili peppers and extracted and isolated the active ingredient Capsaicin.
  3. Test the extraction on bacteria Staphylococcus aureus to see if it could kill the bacteria ---> it is not very effective
  4. Since nīoi was used for wound healing, I tested capsaicin on human skin cells, keratinocytes. I tested for proliferation and migration rates. --->  Cells treated with capsaicin had decreased proliferation (significant data) and lower migration rates (not significant data) than untreated cells. ---> a.k.a. not what I wanted to see!
With the cell work that I've done, I've concluded that I got those results because I was using pure capsaicin and not the nīoi extract, which could have different results since it contains other chemicals and compounds within the chili pepper that contributes to it's medicinal properties. Also, Hawaiian health practitioners hardly ever used just one plant. They always mixed different ingredients for treatments. 

If you have any questions and the plant, my research group, or my research, I would be happy to answer them! 

Comments

  1. UnknownApril 29, 2018 at 10:50 PM

    Such a amazing post. So interesting to read and hear about your project and learn about the different health benefits. Good job :)

    ReplyDelete

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