"Our cancer precursor project has identified 1218 distinct human malignancies"
Nat, are you familiar with the protocol of Thomas Seyfried, professor at Boston College, to treat cancer by starving it to death? (If not, Seyfried has a multitude of lectures available on YouTube going into great detail.) Cancer mitochondria are damaged and have lost the ability to respire, so they have fallen back on the ancient metabolism of fermentation. This is much less productive than respiration, so cancer cells require about 50 times more glucose than healthy cells to produce enough ATP to survive. The key to Seyfried's protocol might be said to be the fact that respiring cells can burn ketones as well as glucose (actually, more cleanly than glucose: less ROS) while cells limited to fermenting cannot, so this provides a clear discriminator between cells to kill and cells to protect.
Seyfried builds upon the theory of Nobel Prize winning chemist, Otto Warburg, that the root of cancer lies in mitochondrial dysfunction forcing the damaged cells to ferment. The genetic mutations are a downstream effect: not the cause. (Unfortunately, in falling back on fermentation to survive, the cells lose their "sociability": it's "ever man for himself".) Hence my reason for quoting you above: chasing the multitude of variable genetic mutations consequent to the mitochondrial dysfunction is to go down a primarily sterile rabbit-hole. What Warburg did not know was that cells with damaged mitochondria can ferment glutamine, the most abundant amino acid in the body, as well as glucose, so they have two available food sources. His not knowing this created downstream facts that are the reason his theory was set aside.
Seyfried's protocol is centered on a rigorous ketogenic diet to reduce the GKI (glucose ketone index), the ratio of serum glucose to serum ketones to a value of 1. Unlike glucose, the body unfortunately has no alternative to glutamine, so simply minimizing it is not workable. So he employs a "press pulse" strategy of periodically administering a glutamine analog to temporarily interfere with cellular ingestion of glutamine. Being temporary it does not harm healthy cells, but it works to kill the starving cancer cells. Another pulse component is hyperbaric oxygen therapy, flooding the body with oxygen: fine for the healthy cells but toxic for the cancer cells. Minimal amounts of conventional Standard Of Care (SOC) components--chemo, radiation, and surgery-- are held off until the cancer is minimized or dead. Surgery may be employed to debulk the cancer remains. The SOC damage (broken cells) creates a feast of glucose for the cancer cells. Feasting them instead of starving them is a highly questionable strategy.
Unfortunately "mainstream" medicine--the Institutes, the medical schools, and big pharma (with no interest in losing their cancer industry)--are locked into their long held dogma that cancer is primarily a genetic disorder. The evidence supports Seyfried, but turning the medical bureaucracy is a slow process. Meanwhile millions die.
1. I don't think cancer is that simple but if his treatment works, that would be great. There is a large gap between the lab and clinical practice but if he can show success with his treatments, others will try to duplicate his results. But my work on complexity science and cancer suggests that there cannot be a "silver bullet", any more than we could solve poverty or illiteracy or any other major problem with one fix.
2. There is no conspiracy among physicians. Sure, some of us are rigid and bureaucratic but most of us live our own lives and pursue ideas that make sense to us.
3. Cancer is due to DNA alterations, at least in part. We know that this is true because we can cure many malignancies based on these DNA alterations. Of course, that is not everything - these alterations change the dominant networks, which bring about and maintain the malignant state, which may include the Warburg effect.
"Our cancer precursor project has identified 1218 distinct human malignancies"
Nat, are you familiar with the protocol of Thomas Seyfried, professor at Boston College, to treat cancer by starving it to death? (If not, Seyfried has a multitude of lectures available on YouTube going into great detail.) Cancer mitochondria are damaged and have lost the ability to respire, so they have fallen back on the ancient metabolism of fermentation. This is much less productive than respiration, so cancer cells require about 50 times more glucose than healthy cells to produce enough ATP to survive. The key to Seyfried's protocol might be said to be the fact that respiring cells can burn ketones as well as glucose (actually, more cleanly than glucose: less ROS) while cells limited to fermenting cannot, so this provides a clear discriminator between cells to kill and cells to protect.
Seyfried builds upon the theory of Nobel Prize winning chemist, Otto Warburg, that the root of cancer lies in mitochondrial dysfunction forcing the damaged cells to ferment. The genetic mutations are a downstream effect: not the cause. (Unfortunately, in falling back on fermentation to survive, the cells lose their "sociability": it's "ever man for himself".) Hence my reason for quoting you above: chasing the multitude of variable genetic mutations consequent to the mitochondrial dysfunction is to go down a primarily sterile rabbit-hole. What Warburg did not know was that cells with damaged mitochondria can ferment glutamine, the most abundant amino acid in the body, as well as glucose, so they have two available food sources. His not knowing this created downstream facts that are the reason his theory was set aside.
Seyfried's protocol is centered on a rigorous ketogenic diet to reduce the GKI (glucose ketone index), the ratio of serum glucose to serum ketones to a value of 1. Unlike glucose, the body unfortunately has no alternative to glutamine, so simply minimizing it is not workable. So he employs a "press pulse" strategy of periodically administering a glutamine analog to temporarily interfere with cellular ingestion of glutamine. Being temporary it does not harm healthy cells, but it works to kill the starving cancer cells. Another pulse component is hyperbaric oxygen therapy, flooding the body with oxygen: fine for the healthy cells but toxic for the cancer cells. Minimal amounts of conventional Standard Of Care (SOC) components--chemo, radiation, and surgery-- are held off until the cancer is minimized or dead. Surgery may be employed to debulk the cancer remains. The SOC damage (broken cells) creates a feast of glucose for the cancer cells. Feasting them instead of starving them is a highly questionable strategy.
Unfortunately "mainstream" medicine--the Institutes, the medical schools, and big pharma (with no interest in losing their cancer industry)--are locked into their long held dogma that cancer is primarily a genetic disorder. The evidence supports Seyfried, but turning the medical bureaucracy is a slow process. Meanwhile millions die.
Thanks for your thoughts.
1. I don't think cancer is that simple but if his treatment works, that would be great. There is a large gap between the lab and clinical practice but if he can show success with his treatments, others will try to duplicate his results. But my work on complexity science and cancer suggests that there cannot be a "silver bullet", any more than we could solve poverty or illiteracy or any other major problem with one fix.
2. There is no conspiracy among physicians. Sure, some of us are rigid and bureaucratic but most of us live our own lives and pursue ideas that make sense to us.
3. Cancer is due to DNA alterations, at least in part. We know that this is true because we can cure many malignancies based on these DNA alterations. Of course, that is not everything - these alterations change the dominant networks, which bring about and maintain the malignant state, which may include the Warburg effect.
Thanks again.