Rhonda Patrick, Ph.D.

So when people have a primary tumor,

the cancer cells that make up that primary tumor don't all necessarily stay at that site of the tumor, right?

So what happens is oftentimes you have these cancer cells that'll escape the primary site, either through the lymphatic system, they get into circulation, and when they're in circulation, they're called circulating tumor cells.

And those circulating tumor cells are not like your normal blood cells.

They're not like your normal white blood cells or red blood cells in your circulation.

They are all kinds of messed up.

They have tons of different mutations.

Your body is ready for them to die.

Like they are ready to die.

They are primed to die.

And the only reason why these cells are not dying is because they have found a way to increase

all of their proteins that are basically stopping them from dying.

And it's like a balancing.

There's like these proteins inside your body that promote death.

And there's these other ones that like stop death.

And it's really just a balance.

So like when the balance goes into promoting death, the cell dies.

If you've got that anti-death, so they're called anti-apoptotic proteins, if they're higher, like even if they're like supposed to die, as long as that signal is saying, no, don't die, they won't die, even though they're all kinds of messed up, right?

And so cancer cells are, that's kind of,

Why chemotherapy, radiation, these things that are very, they're damaging, right?