If the
tumor that Jobs had removed
in 2004 had begun to break down prior to the surgery, White says, the
tumor's
dead cells could have released protease and lipase enzymes that may have damaged beta
cells in the pancreas, which produce insulin.
«We had a hunch that rapidly growing
tumors can «outgrow» their blood supply, resulting
in dead tumor cells that might spill their viral antigens amongst the living cancer
cells,» said co-senior study author Arturo Casadevall, chair of Einstein's Microbiology & Immunology department.