What is Taxol?Taxol is an anti-cancer chemotherapy drug that is mainly used to treat breast, ovarian, bladder, prostate, melanoma and esophageal cancer. It is also used to treat other types of solid tumor cancers.
Taxol is classified as a plant alkaloid, or, more specifically, a taxane. There are many different types of plant alkaloids, and taxane happens to be one of them. So, taxol is basically a type of taxane. The generic name for taxol is paclitaxel. Taxol was originally obtained from the bark of the Pacific yew tree, but now is obtained from the needles of the English yew tree. There are many types of chemotherapy drugs. Taxol happens to be a "cell-specific" drug, meaning that it affects cells during various phases of cell division.
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