Submission statement:

According to a study published in Nature, an international teamof researchers has identified a mechanism that allows cancer cells tospread throughout the body. They found that cancer cells move fasterwhen they are surrounded by thicker fluids, a change that occurs whenlymph drainage is disrupted by a primary tumor.

These findings provide a potential new target for stopping metastasis, which is responsible for 90% of cancer deaths.“Thisis really the first time that the viscosity of the extracellular fluidhas been looked at in detail,” says John D. Lewis, professor and BirdDogs Chair in Translational Oncology at the University of Alberta’sFaculty of Medicine & Dentistry. “Now that we know that fluidviscosity signals cancer cells to move in a specific way, we canpotentially use drugs to basically short-circuit that signaling pathwayand encourage cancer cells to slow down, or even maybe to stop.

The following submission statement was provided by /u/skraddleboop:

Submission statement:

According to a study published in Nature, an international teamof researchers has identified a mechanism that allows cancer cells tospread throughout the body. They found that cancer cells move fasterwhen they are surrounded by thicker fluids, a change that occurs whenlymph drainage is disrupted by a primary tumor.

These findings provide a potential new target for stopping metastasis, which is responsible for 90% of cancer deaths.“Thisis really the first time that the viscosity of the extracellular fluidhas been looked at in detail,” says John D. Lewis, professor and BirdDogs Chair in Translational Oncology at the University of Alberta’sFaculty of Medicine & Dentistry. “Now that we know that fluidviscosity signals cancer cells to move in a specific way, we canpotentially use drugs to basically short-circuit that signaling pathwayand encourage cancer cells to slow down, or even maybe to stop.

Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/1064128/new_study_uncovers_potential_target_for_stopping/j3eh87o/

Not dying is great but are you living or just surviving as an alternative?

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Cancer just sitting there being cancer doesn’t make people die. Most people who get prostate cancer die with prostate cancer not from it for example. When cancer starts to spread around the body and make little bits of cancer all over the place, just growing and growing because that’s what cancer does….ultimately that’s what makes people die from it. The treatment for cancer is all basically different ways of trying to stop it from spreading, slow down the spreading, detect and treat the spreading for as long as possible, and treat the symptoms caused by the damage from the spreading.

If this concept ever bore fruit the idea would be basically just a super effective way of preventing the spreading before it can happen in the first place. So there wouldn’t be damage to fix or live with. There are many many many types of cancer which is why it’s such a big problem for humanity to solve. But if we ever one day discovered a common flaw in all cancers that we could solve and stop them from spreading then that would mean that cancer would change from being a life limiting condition to being more like a chronic medical condition that can be managed. There are lots of cancers that in the past 5-10 years have come leaps and bounds towards achieving this. CML is an example of a cancer we have been able to change into a mostly treatable chronic condition. It is not out of the realm of possibility that one day we will discover a puzzle piece that will allow us to replicate this success. That’s the dream anyways.

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If it stops it killing you after its done serious damage to you - you might probably prefer to die depending on how far it got.

>Cancer just sitting there being cancer doesn’t make people die. Most people who get prostate cancer die with prostate cancer not from it for example. When cancer starts to spread around the body and make little bits of cancer all over the place, just growing and growing because that’s what cancer does….ultimately that’s what makes people die from it.

Cancer that spreads is what inevitably degrades your quality of life, after certain amount of damage even if you are in remission you can still have a severely decreased quality of life depending on the lottery of where cancer spread to.

Yes which is why a treatment that prevents it from spreading and affecting quality of life in the first place to a significant degree would be a game changer

It’s a strategy to interrupt cancer’s ability to spread, this isn’t just about staying alive and limping along, this would actually improve quality of life in the meantime and make your chances of full remission much more likely

So staying really hydrated? There's gotta be more to it than that, but...

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> Cancer just sitting there being cancer doesn’t make people die

In most cases this is true, but brain cancer is a notable exception. It can kill you without metastasis, and will likely degrade your quality of life on the way, because it being there means its squashing your brain.

Stopping it spreading is pretty much a cure for the most part. If cancer never spreads it never reaches terminal, curious why we wouldn't conclude that as a cure ?

>It’s a strategy to interrupt cancer’s ability to spread, this isn’t just about staying alive and limping along, this would actually improve quality of life in the meantime and make your chances of full remission much more likely

My point was do you have to have been diagnosed with cancer first because if so it could have done damage first. Also what if it has spread before hand can it undo it?

Congrats on beating it, but some cancers can affect the brain and some organs which can be forever damaged or need to be removed etc.

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>When my Dad was very ill he confided in me that if he were in a full body cast with eczema and fell over a cliff to find himself perched on a ledge he would still rather live.

There are many examples of people wishing death compared to some conditions out there. Assisted suicide is a thing.

Stopping it from spreading more is always going to be good

This paired with targeted approaches like surgery and radiation which are only going to target a particular tumor would be nice since these approaches only target what is known about already

A lot of people go into remission only for it to pop back up elsewhere, this would presumably make that less likely

It’s not going to help with everyone, but reducing its ability to spread at all or at least to spread more than it already has would certainly be good

Well, think about diabetes for example. It isn’t a death sentence because there are treatments and things you can do to manage how the condition progresses but if you don’t have access to those treatments it’s gonna be a bad time for your longevity. A cure would mean you get a treatment that means you no longer have diabetes and you no longer need to worry about managing it or taking regular treatments to keep it from progressing. Likewise we wouldn’t say we have cured a cancer until we know that it has been completely eliminated with the underlying mutation or trigger or cause so to speak repaired or removed. Even when we can no longer detect cancer in a persons body it is not called cured if it had spread throughout the body it’s simply called “no evidence of disease” because it is likely it will ultimately cause trouble elsewhere in the body. If cancer has not yet spread and is removed then in theory that would be a cure yes.

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Isn't the idea of a vaccine being your immune learns to deal with it so its not a lifelong treatment of taking medication like diabetes? So is that comparable ?

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The guy is a fraud

We’re all just surviving. Your body is a constant battleground, regardless of how healthy you are.

I'm screwed is what your saying?

Stupid clickbait titles man I'm so sick of it. That is not at all what the article implies. This study is very interesting on a fundamental biological point of view but it's highly unlikely that it will provide a viable strategy for treating cancer for a great variety of reasons.

The deadly part of cancer is that it spreads.

We're all just surviving bro.

Or just stop companies like Monsanto from forcing usage of their GMOs and the carcinogenic fertilizers they require.

I hear all these miracle cures every day on this sub but nothing comes out of it for decades.

I agree the title is definitely clickbait. But I do think it has potential because of the fundamental nature of viscosity which can differ in body tissues which can be explored for therapeutic benefit. Im curious though, what are your reasons for why it won’t work?

This just in: doctors eradicate deaths from cancer with this one simple trick!

The trick: Euthanasia

That's not what it's saying. The major major damage cancer does is the drugs we use to kill the tumors kills lots of regular tissue. It's a game of try to kill the tumors before we kill the host. The main reason why we have to use chemotherapy is to stop the cells that are metastasizing so they don't land and grow somewhere else. If you stop that mechanism, they will still grow, but something like skin cancer you can just continually cutout and target to that specific area, which not only would keep the patient from going through chemo, but also not hitting some vital organ somewhere and grow on that.

This would be huge if they could stop metastasizing because cancer would then be more like a benign tumor now and be so much less deadly.

The thicker fluid probably contains molecules from dead cells that causes cells to travel elsewhere and repair wounds since cell migration is one of the ways to heal wounds.

So such a healing mechanism got taken advantage of by the mutants to migrate elsewhere as well and cause harm.

Yes, however that might be a bit of a blurry line depending on if this is a vaccine you must get boosters for for the rest of your life or if it’s a single treatment.

Always see headlines like this. My step-father always says “they could cure cancer but that would put too many people out of a job”. Idk what source feeds him that, but he always stands behind that. Is there any substance to that sort of claim? I need some counter-arguments, unless this is a generally accepted belief and I’m just a hopeful outsider

He would need to first understand that there are many different kinds of cancer, each with different characteristics, "cancer" is just kind of a grab bag.

Next we do "cure cancer", it's called being in complete remission. Some cancers it's easier than others, again because there are different kinds. A good example is that when discovered rapamycin was viewed as a cancer cure, but there are still things like pancreatic cancer or leukemia that it doesn't affect.

There is some ground for his statement, at least in America, that if research discovers something that cannot be done in a way that is profitable then it's not likely to be implemented, at least not as enthusiastic. And even if it is, the time between development and distribution can be long from redtape.

But if a couple very expensive pills that treated all cancer were made, and kept it in partial remission leaving the patient in good functional health as a worker, while keeping them coming back for more like the pills made for HIV afflicted people, it would be much more profitable than our current situation. And those pills haven't been made, let alone any simple ones than can provide catch all full remission.

I think just mentioning that having healthy workers, in partial remission, on an expensive pill covered by insurance every day for the rest of their life, is a safe and profitable means of making money compared to all the cancer patients who die with no estate to pay off their debts. And since that expensive pill does not exist then it's probably not that easy to make.

Not that he will believe it anyway.

Cancer just sitting in one spot and not growing isn’t cancer anymore. It’s more like an annoying tattoo

oh wow. i bet rich people are really excited! /s

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Found the Canadian /s

Holy fuck...I thought that said cocaine deaths at first.

It's gotten to the point where idgaf about cancer news until people can actually go to the hospital and get the treatment.

Cancer has been 90% cured 100 times in the passed decade but nothing ever comes into practical use.

Not to mention, their long history of carcinogenic herbicide and chemical weapons manufacture. Now Beyer, BTW.

I was just listening to a podcast where this guy was mentioning how over the past 30 years, he's only been sick twice, once with a cold and the other time with COVID, where his symptoms were as mild as a cold. And he was mentioning how important it was to be hydrated. We've known for a long time that it is important to be hydrated, but maybe it's important in ways we didn't/don't fully understand yet.

It is a clickbaity title, I'll give you that. However, it is what the article implies.

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>it's highly unlikely that it will provide a viable strategy for treating cancer for a great variety of reasons.

Based on what?

Oh well if it takes decades to develop a new strategy to fight cancer, as we learn more about cancer, then forget it!

:P

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I've heard people say that too. "They won't cure cancer because it would cost the medical industry too much money." But my thinking is that if they are of such lack of moral character that they would put money over lives like that - they would solve cancer in a heartbeat and take the fame and money that would come from it, and not hold back for some big picture career protection of their fellow medical researchers' jobs.

Is it possible that you are not actually keeping up with cancer research and are simply not aware of new approaches and new treatments that are coming about?

I think this was the last straw for me. It's completely obvious click bait and this sub can't see it. I'm out. So long r/furureology

It’s still cancer, local invasion, crowding, and excretion of products are still going to be harmful

>However, it is what the article implies.

No, it doesn't: while it is true that cancer death is due to metastasis in 90% of cases, this approach wouldn't affect pre-existing metastasis at all (it only affects the motility of cancer cells, so the propensity of a cancer to metastasize). So if you have metastasis at the time of diagnosis, which is the case in most deadly cancer, this approach is most likely completely useless. And if you don't have metastasis at the time of diagnosis, this approach is also in most cases irrelevant, because the way to go is simply surgical removal of the primary tumor. Diagnosis without mets is generally refered to as stage 1 cancer and often has very low mortality, with some exceptions.

Mostly this: targetting the metastatic process (that is the dissemination of cells originating from the primary tumor) is in most cases irrelevant because a) in the great majority of cases of cancers that will eventually lead to death, the diagnosis occurs when a tumor has already metastasized. This approach won't cure pre-existing mets, which are generally responsible for the lethality of cancer. And b) if you don't have mets yet, in the vast majority of cases, surgical removal of the primary tumor is the obvious solution. The only application that I can see is if you have a non-metastatic tumor which is not operable. It happens but is certainly by far not the majority of cases. So implying that you might stop 90% of cancer deaths is just plain wrong.

There are additional mechanistic reasons but I think that alone is sufficient to relegate this process quite low in terms of likelihood of sucessful prevention of cancer-related death.

There's a lot of low-hanging fruit involving cancer that gets ignored.

Cancer cells seem to proliferate faster in high-sugar solution. But patients don't get told to go on a low-sugar diet. German researchers found about 100 years ago that fasting can slow cancer growth, and sometimes put cancer in remission. This too does not get much discussion in the US. No money in it.

Instead we get incredibly expensive chemotherapeutics (antibody drug conjugates for example) that have incredibly toxic payloads and at best extend the patient's life a few months.

Comparatively it’s miraculous were we to get just 20% of some cancers to remain chronic. Novel treatments for isolated cancerous cells without metastatic movement would become a new focus. What a great future that would be.

Absolutely, most extremely deadly cancers are only that way because of the veracity of the mets

Have you augmented your diet in light of the data you have seen re: fasting/low sugar diets?

Identifying the key pathway and mechanism used by cancer to metastasis is a step to intervening and blocking cancer from metastasizing. And given the majority of mortalities are a result of cancer metastasizing understanding this pathway is a big first step to reducing mortality. Saying empirically it would cut 90% of deaths is clickbaity but this is a big discovery. If we apply this and begin to develop ways of controlling the fluid viscosity around cancer cells we have a practical application of this knowledge. Combine this with methods of early detection and you have a real shot of limiting cancer deaths.

It's not that simple. Yes cancer cells are sugar addicted and grow faster in vitro in high sugar environments. But blood sugar is tightly regulated by insulin. So eating less sugar does not directly starve cancer cells in your body.

You're a liar. You don't know the man nor his situation . And I'm sure you have not viewed the documentary

I would politely respond to your assertion with some published evidence to the contrary: see ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6375425/

Ketogenic Diets and Cancer: Emerging Evidence

Jocelyn Tan-Shalaby, MD

PMID: 30766299

The quality of discourse on this sub as well as the intelligence level is incredibly low, so he/she is probably unaware, yeah.

ó_ò Well... but..... ò_ó

I don't know if you're familiar with the scientific publishing world, but there is a reason why this is published in a very cryptic journal with a dysmal impact factor of 0.7. We can discuss why this review is extremely weak in private if you wish :) And very importantly, and maybe you missed it, the abstract talks about combination of KD with other therapeutic approaches.

>Combining a ketogenic diet with standard chemotherapeutic and radiotherapeutic options may help improve tumor response, although more research is needed.

Combination approached have indeed shown promises in some models: for example a ketogenic diet greatly potentiates PI3K inhibitors in some models of cancer but is insufficient to reduce mortality by itself: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6197057/

This is undoubtedly an interesting research topic and it is very likely that diet can help in some (if not many) therapeutic settings. But claiming that it is enough to cure cancer by itself is just dangerous and wrong.