Travis Christofferson

Tripping over the Truth (2017)

How the Metabolic Theory of Cancer Is Overturning One of Medicine's Most Entrenched Paradigms

In the wake of the Cancer Genome Atlas project's failure to provide a legible roadmap to a cure for cancer, science writer Travis Christofferson illuminates a promising blend of old and new perspectives on the disease. Tripping over the Truth follows the story of cancer’s proposed metabolic origin from the vaunted halls of the German scientific golden age to modern laboratories around the world. The reader is taken on a journey through time and science that results in an unlikely connecting of the dots with profound therapeutic implications.

Tripping over the Truth reads like a detective novel, full of twists and cover-ups, blind-alleys and striking moments of discovery by men and women with uncommon vision, grit, and fortitude. Ultimately, Christofferson arrives at a conclusion that challenges everything we thought we knew about the disease, suggesting the reason for the failed war against cancer stems from a flawed paradigm that categorizes cancer as an exclusively genetic disease.

In a sharp departure from the current “targeted” revolution occurring in cancer pharmaceuticals, the metabolic therapies highlighted have one striking feature that sets them apart—the potential to treat all types of cancer because they exploit the one weakness that is common to every cancer cell: dysfunctional metabolism.

Tripping Over the Truth: The Metabolic Theory of Cancer.  The book offers a historical perspective on the reemerging metabolic theory of cancer — a theory that contends cancer is precipitated and driven by damage to mitochondria. (23 minutes)

Published by: Epigenix Foundation: Published on 8 Jun 2016

Tripping over the Truth

Travis Christofferson is a science writer and the author of the recently released book Tripping Over the Truth: The Metabolic Theory of Cancer. The book offers a historical perspective on the reemerging metabolic theory of cancer — a theory that contends cancer is precipitated and driven by damage to mitochondria.

"Travis Christofferson provides a compelling historical account of how cancer has been misunderstood as a genetic disease when, in fact, it is a type of metabolic disease. Unlike normal cells, which obtain their energy from respiration, cancer cells have damaged respiration and obtain much of their energy from the primitive process of fermentation. Travis describes how the mutations in tumors arise as an effect of respiratory damage and cannot be the cause or drivers of cancer. The information presented in Tripping over the Truth will have profound consequences for how cancer is managed and prevented. Metabolic therapies will be more effective and less toxic than the current gene- or immune-based therapies and have the potential to significantly improve quality of life and long-term survival for millions of cancer patients worldwide.”

Thomas N. Seyfried, PhD, author of Cancer as a Metabolic Disease