A killer substance (Score 2, Interesting)

The apoptotic path involved in capsaicin killing of cancer cells - its been previously shown to induce suicides in other kinds of cancer cells as well - is not the only road to cell death that hot chili takes us down.

One of the more memorable factoids from a neurobiology course I took years back was that the long-term desenzitation that one experiences from enjoying a capsaicin-rich diet is due to cell death in the taste buds. Short term adaptation does occur via another mechanism, but tastbud necrosis is important in the long term. This also explains why you feel the impact of the tex mex spice much more after not having had any for a few months - you have regrown the previously killed taste buds!

The tast bud death is however a necrotic effect - cell killing, via a vanilloid receptor - rather than suicide. See e g Caterina MJ et al, Nature 1997.