Radio Waves Target Cancer Cells Without Side Effects

TELLURIDE – Curled up and shivering in the back seat of a support truck, Zach Dunbar’s entry into Telluride over Lizard Head Pass on Monday wasn’t exactly what he had planned.

That’s because the 18-year-old from Erie, Penn., is meant to be tracing a roughly 4,000-mile route between San Francisco and his hometown on two wheels, not four.

So the experience left him a bit disappointed with his performance.

“I really wasn’t feeling well yesterday,” he said during an interview on Tuesday, adding that after getting caught in the rain, he needed some help getting over the hump.

“It might have been the altitude,” he speculated.

Nevertheless, Dunbar is on a mission to promote research into a cutting-edge and, thus far, promising cancer treatment developed by a retired Erie businessman, John Kanzius. By riding across the country, Dunbar plans to talk to as many people as possible to raise the visibility of, and money for, the Erie-based John Kanzius Cancer Research Foundation.

Dunbar got the inspiration to embark on a cross-county trip as he prepared to graduate from the Erie First Christian Academy in early June. He had ridden and enjoyed a couple of 50-mile days the previous summer, but beyond that, he wasn’t exactly what one would call an avid cyclist. Nevertheless, the idea grew and, with it, knowledge of how it could be used to raise money and awareness for the cause.

He realized, “I could be doing something I could enjoy and be doing something good at the same time.”

And since the initial success of Kanzius’s cancer treatment has made him something of a local hero, Dunbar’s choice was easy.

“He has a lot of hometown support,” Dunbar said.

“It’s great that anybody is working to cure cancer,” he added. “But it was a very worthy cause because of the progress it has made in such a short period of time.”

Before retirement, Kanzius’s career spanned all aspects of broadcasting, from engineering to management and ownership. But it was his own diagnosis of terminal leukemia in 2002 that led him to develop a non-invasive, non-toxic cancer treatment using the very radio waves he had built his life around.

Sick and insomniac from his own chemotherapy, he began pondering a way to treat cancer without the toxic side effects of radiation and chemotherapy. With his knowledge of broadcast engineering, he began considering the possibilities of radio frequency waves.

“He remembered that when he walked through the radio station the quarters would heat up in his pocket,” said Dunbar, who had lunch with Kanzius the day he departed.

The Kanzius treatment works by injecting nanoparticles of metal or carbon into tumors. Once injected, the patient is then exposed to targeted, high-power radio waves delivered by sophisticated radio transmission equipment of Kanzius’s creation. Those waves then heat the particles, like the radio station waves heated the coins in the inventor’s pockets, which destroy the cancer cells.

Two of Kanzius’s devices are currently being tested at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.

When the nanoparticles are injected directly into solid, localized tumors, the treatment has successfully killed cancer cells in animal studies. However, treating the microscopic “rogue cells” that cause cancer to spread is more difficult, which is why researchers are trying to develop molecules programmed specifically to target cancer cells and to which they can attach the nanoparticles, according to a recent 60 Minutes report.

Although the treatment has been successful in killing cancer cells while causing no known, adverse side effects, human trials are still years away. Thus, the reason why Dunbar rides, joined by Randy Hoobler, his girlfriend Laci’s father, and by Laci and her mother, Karen Hoobler, in a support vehicle.

“The treatment may not cure you, but it isn’t going to kill you,” said Dunbar, referring to the toxic side effects of traditional cancer treatments.

The quartet departed San Francisco on June 15 and made its way to Telluride mostly by way of Highway 50, otherwise known as “The Loneliest Road in America” through Nevada and southern Utah.

True to its moniker, the route has, at times, provided little opportunity for Dunbar to publicize his cause as much as he would like.

“It has been dissatisfying when we’re not able to talk to people,” because of the isolated route that meanders through small towns, Dunbar said. Nevertheless, he has managed to spread the word and raise $500 through a few large donations so far.

“People are making donations which are overwhelming,” he said.

If all goes to plan, Dunbar will arrive home in Erie on Aug. 8, just in time to leave for college two weeks later. He and Laci will both attend Asbury College in Wilmore, Ky., where he will study business management and youth ministry; she has not yet decided on a major.

“I’m very proud of him,” said Laci. “It’s good to know he’s doing all this for cancer research.”

To keep pace with Dunbar’s journey, visit www.cyclingforacure.blogspot.com. To donate, checks or money orders payable to the John Kanzius Cancer Research Foundation may be mailed in care of Cycling For a Cure, 247 West 29th St., Erie, PA 16508 or visit www.kanziuscancerresearch.org.