- A new hypothesis emerged that the 18,000-person CARET trial failed because high-dose β-carotene and other antioxidants up-regulate the Nrf2 pathway, raising intracellular glutathione and blunting the oxidative stress that chemotherapy and radiotherapy rely on to kill cancer cells.  
- Participants discussed deliberately depleting glutathione (e.g., via dietary restriction or xenobiotics) to push rapidly dividing, ROS-producing cancer cells past their oxidative-stress tolerance, thereby slowing tumor growth and selecting for slower, less aggressive clones.  
- A review paper on the inverse relationship between glutathione levels and chemotherapy efficacy was shared: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S014296122100466X.  
- jrayhawk noted that retinoids increase vitamin-D demand and compete with vitamin-D for RXR receptors; failing to co-administer vitamin D with retinoids can undermine myeloid differentiation and confound cancer trials.  
- docl proposed injecting dilute, isotonic H₂O₂ near tumors to deliver a transient ROS pulse, and later floated engineering respirocyte-like oxygen carriers that switch from releasing to absorbing O₂ when local oxidative stress is detected, starving tumors of oxygen.  
- The group emphasized that tumors are genetically heterogeneous; killing the fastest-growing, oxidation-sensitive sub-clones often leaves slower, more robust cells, so any oxidative-stress-based therapy must account for evolutionary selection.