Barrier-Free Examination Table: Fill & Download for Free

tldr: The scope of this question is potentially larger than it appears. Disadvantages apply to personal, hobby, research-level soldering such as prototype design by engineers. Disadvantage also apply to industrial production, all industries involving electronics.Disadvantages of lead-free solders:The flux core in the wire and lead-free fluxes contain harsh reducing agents that are highly irritating to wet membranes like the sinuses and the eyesThe flux used in lead-free soldering has a shelf life because exposure to oxygen reduces the effectiveness of the core in the solder. For this reason, many solder companies have introduced expiration dates for their flux-core solders instead of just printing the DOM (date of manufacture).lead-free solder is mostly, tin, silver, copper :: Sn, Ag, Cu, or other metals. The temperature required to get a lead-free solder alloy into its molten, “eutectic”* state which allows for proper wetting is greater than that required for soldering with Sn60Pb40 or Sn63Pb37 Lead-tin solder; significantly hotter in centigrade or Fahrenheit (C or F).Table source linkGood old Sn60Pb40 (or Sn63Pb37) undergoes a phase change from solid to liquid (molten) at a [specific] eutectic point. 183 degrees C (highlighted in yellow)SAC (SnAgCu305) is likely the most common lead-free solder. SAC305 is a lead-free alloy that contains 96.5% tin, 3% silver, and 0.5% copper. The phase change from solid to liquid occurs over a range (217–220)The phase change from solid to liquid is not at a single [eutectic] point or temperature value for this lead-free alloy, SAC 305, and so is technically a non-eutectic solder.Wetting is a property of liquids. Wetting is crucial to the formation of acceptable or superior solder joints. Wetting occurs as a phase change from solid to liquid (flux is crucial for this wetting as well), then heating it to the eutectic temperature.Flux allows for heated solid solder to wet and be wet in open air. This is similar to how surfactants such as soaps help water (liquid) become “wetter.”Flux helps solder wet properly, as the solder moves to the two surfaces being heating temporarily with the soldering iron tip.The less-than-desirable “eutectic range” for the alloy itself can account forless than ideal wettinga different appearance from other metallic alloysLead-free solders also differ in their greater surface tension, specifically, and which can be seen exaggerated in specialty solder alloys such as Sn96Ag04, tin solder or Silvergleem. This is a solder alloy used for jewelry, for example. The surface tension of lead-free solders results in playfulness on the tip, flux is essential (but caustic or corrosive)technique must be modified, if accustomed to normal electronicslead-free solder will require specialized, (upgraded) tips, especially if the tip temperature is determined by the model number of the tip (e.g. Metcal brand), and not a variable temperature dial, tips which could be expensive to replace lead-solder tipsthere is a good amount of reason to consider that the higher temperatures required for making good solder joints with lead-free solder could be responsible for the premature failure of active semiconductor components as a trend, some of which have low temperature exposure tolerances.When soldering is done with leaded-solder, there is somewhat of a correlation between the qualitative appearance of the joint (shiny, smooth) and the electrical conductivity and mechanical strength, the two most important qualities provided by Mr. solder joint.When lead-free solder is used, appearance and qualities like “shininess” are not really an indication of a good solder joint.If you are totally new to soldering and you have a lot of it to do (for example, to complete a large engineering project that will determine your final grade)you may not learn how to solder sufficiently well if you use lead-free when learning to solder. (i.e., don’t waste your time!!)This situation would be made worse if one is also attempting to learn using lead-free solder that is old, expired, oxidized or using lead-free flux that is expired.It would be worse or least ideal to the also use old, oxidized soldering tip(s) and/or a soldering iron lacking power in Wattage available, or temperature prevision.Learning what good soldering looks like, through first-hand experience is easiest achieved by using the old leaded solder, it is the starting point for soldering (even with mandated lead-free ROHS in industry) and how to adjust your technique to the idiosyncratic demands of lead-free alloysIn addition, the inability to make good solder joints leads to other issues:hidden resistances in solder joint(s) and which become worse over timesolder joints so poor that they begin to act as thermal intermittentscold, dry joints that are not conductive as they should be and lack mechanical strengthtrying to troubleshoot the source of an issue when the problem was that one or two solder joints on an IC chip simply do not have a good electrical connection (in terms of conductivity) to the circuit because of a lack of experience in spotting defective solder joints when using lead-free. This could lead to hours pr days of frustration and running in circles when circuit analysis won’t help you figure it out because it could be one crappy solder joint.The alternative:Use leaded solder for your projectsWash your hands every time you touch solder, just as you do after say, doing woodwork or working on a car.Do not eat, drink, smoke, apply cosmetics, till you wash your hands thoroughly and you are done soldering, just like doing any DIY project.Keep your area clean and out-of-reach to children or pets. Wipe up your work area and static-dissipative mat to clean up solder balls and bits.Use a solder (lead-waste) container, or substitute for one, e.g., a medium sized coffee can where contaminated items can be dumped (when they are cool).Contain leaded solder waste such as solder balls and bits in that container such as solder wick, brass wool for conditioning your solder tips, bad components, etc.Dispose of this waste at electronic-recycling collection events or contact your waste management company.Unless you are a business that requires so much soldering that you would be classified as a small, medium, or large waste-generator:you don’t have to use lead-free. Doing so doesn’t mean you are more conscientious or a “better person.” Simply manage the handling and disposal of the waste, just like you do when you change the oil in your car.Alloys containing lead versus lead saltsSolder as an alloy is composed of tin and lead and which has a super-strong outer surface layer of oxidation.Solid solder, as in the case of solder wire, has an oxidative coating on the surface. This coating results from exposure to ambient air which contains oxygen that bonds to surface atoms. The oxidative coating on metals may be held strongly. For example, the oxidative coating on aluminum is an invisible barrier that makes it corrosion proof.Years ago, certain products had lead incorporated into them, notably in indoor house paint. The paint contained lead, but not as metal but as lead salts, or molecular compounds containing lead. If ingested, as paint chips that eroded off walls and eaten by infants, the lead would be easily digested and easily absorbed by the body as toxic, heavy metals.Is it possible to handle pure lead (Pb) metal slabs and get some on the hands? Then not wash one’s then eat a bag of popcorn? Pure lead is “soft” and can rub off on hands but solder is mostly tin, not pure lead metal.Leaded solder is best to learn. In fact, if you paid money to learn from a training organization that offers certifications, you would be trained using leaded solder.They don’t have the time and patience for you to not show some good results from training.Leaded solder is how people have learned soldering and continue to learn to solder correctlyedit, in case this question was meant for industry, I touch upon here, a case where the rubber meets the road regarding lead-free versus leaded solder allows used in automated production:An ideal solder joint with have two (2) key characteristics:good electrical conductivity that results from the proper reflow and wetting within a non-oxidized and contaminant free solder jointmechanical strength of the solder joint that connects two different surfaces togetherIn electronics, through-hole components and through-hole board designs were dominant. The processes for soldering through-hole components into plated through-hole barrels (PTH) that transect the board, were highly reliable yet they were based on lead-containing alloys.Wave machines solder pots, utilizing molten solder pools, to solder all the components to a board well, reliably, and verifiable quickly by visual inspection, were the standard.That said, currently it is not feasible or even possible to maintain pools of molten lead-free solder, using the lead-free alloys currently available.to be clear: It is possible to create a molten pool that is restricted in area during the process of selective soldering, for brief periods, while under or inside a non-oxidative environment. The process is done in a nitrogen gas saturated system and not done in ambient air. I could be done under argon Ar(l) a completely unreactive or noble, gas.here is a wonderful video the demonstrates selective soldering: link I know the video is 10 yrs old but selective soldering for lead-free processes still looks similar to that today in 2020.it’s optional, premium technologyMost electronics today are fabricated using surface mount technology or SMT technology. The components are attached only to the surface of a board, and not through it.SMT technology utilizes solder paste, distributed in precise volumes onto the board surface using stencils and a squeegee. Components (SMD or surface mount devices) are tacked onto a board using a pick and place machine (thousands of them and teeny-tiny). The solder paste provides enough tackiness (stickiness) to hold the components in place and during convection reflow. This process for surface mount components works using lead-free solder pastes works generally well.The exception is for components that are so important that they must be soldered into a board designed for through-hole technologies using plated through-holes and this regards many I/O connectors that provide, for example, many functions or many signal channels and many small pins within many holes.Because molten solder pools are not great with lead-free alloys, such as with wave-soldering machines, many manufacturers must now rely on a process called “intrusive soldering.”Intrusive soldering is the use of surface mount convection reflow ovens to solder through-hole components, while still using SMT-purposed solder paste. Intrusive soldering is also called Pin-in-Paste (PIP) or Pin-in-hole-paste (PIHP) soldering. This is done when waves [of molten solder] were used previously for those. Intrusive soldering is a new approach to soldering based on, and also resulted from, RoHS (lead-free) prescribed protocol.Source, images: http://www.ami.ac.uk/courses/topics/0226_pip/index.htmlNotice the concave shapes (versus convex) or bumpy appearance to the solder. Lead-free solders tend to have greater surface tension. Often will also see darker solder at the surface, usually as partially reflowed solder paste when everything out of a wave machine looks as shiny metal that clearly reached a state of liquidus, displaying properties of wetting and of solder that reached its eutectic temperature—the point or narrow temperature range for phase change; solid becomes liquid.Intrusive soldering however, is mostly experimental since each process and oven temperature profile must be tweaked for every particular assembly. It is an ad hoc process, mostly trial-and-error—tweaking or adjusting oven temperature profiles to produce desirable outcomes. Often the first production run of a single circuit board with these connectors will be defective and scrapped (something now expected), and the oven temperatures tweaked on the next run.Due to the experimental nature of intrusive soldering, agreement by convention will be difficult to standardize or attain.Not everyone agrees that Pin-in-Paste (PIP) or Pin-in-hole-paste (PIHP), aka intrusive soldering, can allow for standardized improvements or even produce acceptable solder joints (results similar to those allowed for previously with leaded solders) with the currently available alloys.For this reason, through-hole connectors must be soldered by hand for lead-free alloys and cannot depend on convection reflow methods whenever a connector is used in a very important circuit board, especially in the case of mission-critical class-3 circuit boards, such as those placed in satellites which are very difficult to service once they’re in orbit. For this reason, intrusive soldering has not yet been accepted by IPC as a reliable method that can be standardized. Instead, IPC urges direct oversight by an astute soldering technician/process engineer and the onus is on them to get the process right by tweaking it for every individual assembly, but for class-2 boards (consumer level) at best.There are some perceived advantages to cost, to using this unconventional means of installing through-hole components with convection reflow of solder pasted just as a reduction in the number of process steps, taken with a grain of salt because the solder joints created with intrusive soldering simply cannot reach target criteria, but only acceptable conditions at best.A solder joint can be Target (nearly perfect), or Acceptable (not too shabby), or non-conforming or Defective.Only hand-soldering of through hole components with lead-free solder wire and not paste, can allow for Target solder joints.Intrusive soldering of through-hole components using solder paste in a convection reflow process:results in “Acceptable” solder joints, at bestmore easily allows for non-conforming characteristics (solder joints with insufficient solder, solder joints with voids or pockets of air, cold (non-reflowed) solder jointscomes with a known trade-off of having solder joints that do not have the same conductivity and mechanical strength of through-hole components installed with leaded solders (but may suffice for say, cheap consumer electronics).Soldering through-hole components with lead free solder paste and using SMT convection reflow is often problematic compared to the older process which was highly consistent, highly reliable in producing target solder joints.There was a huge advantage to established processes involving lead-containing solders and technologies, but these are no longer in use whenever lead-free alloys are required, and also because of the different chemistries involved with leaded-and lead free solders.The closest thing today for lead-free solders to the past wave technology with leaded solder, is called selective soldering. Selective soldering requires a specialized machine with cameras and PC, but also cooling with liquid nitrogen. So it add cost to the process where arguably the electronics don’t have to be 100% perfect in aesthetics as long as they’re 100% functional.The disadvantage was that lead-waste in electronics is not and was not being processed as waste, properly, only an estimated 15% of old electronics is recycled appropriately.This is an example of a challenge or disadvantage presented by the transition from leaded to lead-free solders.edit: One other big disadvantage to lead-free solder alloys that should be mentioned involves the formation of microscopic metallurgical “whiskers,” more specifically “tin whiskers” and also “zinc whiskers” that have been increasingly associated with lead-free solder alloys.Image:Image, same source:The formation of these whiskers is as yet not well-understood. What is clear from just the images above is that these develop over time and essential create tiny short-circuit or bridging conditions, instead of discrete, isolated components.For this other reason, highly and critically important soldering electronics does not use lead-free solders. The best examples of highly critical soldering involves Class 3 electronics [mentioned above] (mission-critical electronics with absolutely the lowest possible fail rates, such as in jet planes, defense applications, rockets and satellites, other examples follow), which still utilize lead-based alloys still, because of the tin-whisker problem correlated with lead-free solder alloys in electronics.[Effects of]:Whiskers [Wikipedia] can cause short circuits and arcing in electrical equipment. The phenomenon was discovered by telephone companies in the late 1940s and it was later found that the addition of lead to tin solder provided mitigation.[4]The European Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive (RoHS), that took effect on July 1, 2006, restricted the use of lead in various types of electronic and electrical equipment. This has driven the use of lead-free alloys with a focus on preventing whisker formation, see § Mitigation and elimination. Others have focused on the development of oxygen-barrier coatings to prevent whisker formation.[5]Airborne zinc whiskers have been responsible for increased system failure rates in computer server rooms.[6]Zinc whiskers grow from galvanized (electroplated) metal surfaces at a rate of up to a millimeter per year with a diameter of a few micrometres. Whiskers can form on the underside of zinc electroplated floor tiles on raised floors due to stresses applied when walking over them; and these whiskers can then become airborne within the floor plenum when the tiles are disturbed, usually during maintenance. Whiskers can be small enough to pass through air filters and can settle inside equipment, resulting in short circuits and system failure.Tin whiskers don't have to be airborne to damage equipment, as they are typically already growing in an environment where they can produce short circuits. At frequencies above 6 GHz or in fast digital circuits, tin whiskers can act like miniature antennas, affecting the circuit impedance and causing reflections. In computer disk drives they can break off and cause head crashes or bearing failures. Tin whiskers often cause failures in relays, and have been found upon examination of failed relays in nuclear power facilities.[7] Pacemakers have been recalled due to tin whiskers.[8]Research has also identified a particular failure mode for tin whiskers in vacuum (such as in space), where in high-power components a short-circuiting tin whisker is ionized into a plasma that is capable of conducting hundreds of amperes of current, massively increasing the damaging effect of the short circuit.[9]The possible increase in the use of pure tin in electronics due to the RoHS directive drove JEDEC and IPC to release a tin whisker acceptance testing standard and mitigation practices guideline intended to help manufacturers reduce the risk of tin whiskers in lead-free products.[10]Silver whiskers often appear in conjunction with a layer of silver sulfide which forms on the surface of silver electrical contacts operating in an atmosphere rich in hydrogen sulfide and high humidity. Such atmospheres can exist in sewage treatment and paper mills.(Another such atmosphere that is high is hydrogen sulfide gases and involve humidity is at the deep sea vents at the bottom of the ocean. So very small deep-sea submarines or so submersibles such as the ALVIN may also be susceptible.)Whiskers over 20 µm in length were observed on gold-plated surfaces and noted in a 2003 NASA internal memorandum.[11]The effects of metal whiskering were chronicled on History Channel's program Engineering Disasters 19.image from the link below:Doctoral student unravels 'tin whisker' mysteryYong Sun, a mechanical engineering doctoral student at the University of South Carolina's College of Engineering and Computing, has solved part of the puzzle.…Sun's findings were published in the Scripta Materialia, a materials science journal. This fall he won the prestigious Acta Student Award, one of only six to receive the honor. A team of editors from Acta Materials, Scripta Materialia and Acta Biomaterials evaluated the applications and Sun beat out students from the world's top universities, including MIT."This shows that our research in material science is reaching an international audience," Sun said. "It is nice to be recognized for our work."The importance of that work goes well beyond extending the operating life of consumer electronics. NASA has verified multiple commercial satellite failures it attributes to tin whiskers. Missile systems, nuclear power stations and heart pacemakers also have fallen victim to tin whiskers over the past several decades and they are also considered a suspect in reported brake failures in Toyota vehicles.While manufactures had been able to control some whiskers by mixing small amounts of lead into tin solder, the 2006 European Union ban on lead in most electronic equipment had ignited a debate among scientists about whether whiskers would remain a perpetual problem. Some observers even predict that it's only a matter of time before miniature devices built after the ban start failing en masse.Xiaodong Li, a professor in USC's Department of Mechanical Engineering who served as an adviser on the research, said Yong's work likely will prompt manufacturer to design lead-free products that diffuse stress."This (research) is a very big deal. As we move toward nano-scale devices, this is a problem that needs to be solved," Li said.Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2012-12-doctoral-student-unravels-tin-whisker.html#jCpFinally, it should be noted that IPC, the industry standard setting organization for electronic solder joints, has received and documented examples of 63Sn/37Pb solder with tin whiskers, provided by documented cases from NASA and Goddard Space Flight.So even the usual solder used for aerospace application has been demonstrated to present a potential for tin whiskers if the unit was ultimately retrievable.My first experiences with soldering did not include any mention of safety or the implications of heavy metals, but played with my elder brother’s soldering equipment when he took a course on electronics. I played with solder casually, didn’t even wash my hands, so I look back and wondered if I had been exposed to more-than-healthful levels of lead.There are many threats that are toxic to biological life forms, many of which are never publicized or addressed. The article I recently added mentions that there have been few or singular solutions to mitigate the problem of tin whiskers, besides adding small amounts of lead to mitigate tin whiskers and device failure in the field.Tin whiskers have also been documented by NASA for aerospace electronics on Sn63Pb37 alloy, the standard military/aerospace solder alloy, in very-long-service satellites.It’s “two steps forward, one step back,” (adding lead minimizes the problem better than any alternative)while the good intentions may be misplaced in the first place and possibly a hindrance to engineering pursuits. In the case of cardiac pacemakers, I would think that lead has a sufficiently good reason to be used, perhaps with special insulation, polymeric, or conformal coatings, the RoHS directive in medical devices may be overly rigid when exceptions should be made, such as with pacemakers.Thank you for reading

YES, definitely, it is about BIG business and MEGA profits made despite the enormous pain, suffering and death of tens of millions of people worldwide every year. There are two pieces of evidence why cancer is a business and one is plainly economics. But the other, which is the key evidence, is the scientific evidence! So it will make this a long answer.ECONOMICS.There is in the world today, and especially in countries like the USA, a medical industry, which might be better called a medical industrial complex. Every year there is a huge production of pharmaceuticals and other items for medical use, which need to be moved to markets. But unlike the military stocks of the military industrial complex, pharmaceuticals need to be moved quickly because drugs have a limited shelf life.Certainly to guarantee the movement of stocks, diseases, which are not curable are an advantage but there also needs to be ever increasing markets, so the incidence of disease needs to be increasing. And that is what we are seeing taking place dramatically in the last 50 years.However, unlike the military industrial complex, which can be advantaged by orchestrating new and ongoing serious conflicts and wars to reap profits, the medical industrial complex can’t do the same. The large disease markets cannot be generated directly. However the means, by which disease manifests, can be encouraged and supported. I can only explain how this is so, in the light of the medical evidence. So I will discuss this matter last.Now, in many countries, again the USA being a leader, the corporate citizen does not have to be a good citizen. The corporate citizen has only a responsibility to the shareholders; to bring home the bacon. And this the medical industry does admirably, thanks to the way cancer and other diseases are promoted are marketed! This brings us to the second piece of evidence, the science or medical evidence.Cancer is sold to the public as a genetic disease.Causes. The claim is that some random, genetic mutation or mutations may arise, either from damage or miscopied genes and that it leads to uncontrolled cell growth.2. Carcinogenisis. With uncontrolled cell growth, the cell accumulates more and more mutations so as to become an abnormal or cancer cell.3. Bad luck.The immune system fails to destroy the abnormal cell so,4. Tumorigenesis. it goes on to becomes a mass of abnormal or rogue cells, i.e., a cancer.5. Invasion and metastasis. Finally some rogue cells break away to invade neighbouring tissues or go on to colonise other parts of the body.And it is a disease, which cannot be cured because even when there is no more evidence of disease, well… “it can come back”. Furthermore the medical treatment they give, the standard of care can give you cancer they say. And survival rates are defined as the chance of surviving another 5 years after diagnosis.Thus cancer is understood by the general public as the enemy within, which is self-inflicted and which can be a death sentence if you don’t let the doctors fight it aggressively.The cancer story has the patient frightened enough to say “doc, do whatever treatment. I’ll pay anything you ask. Just make it go away!” It puts the doctors in the driver’s seat and the patient no longer in control of their life.I am going to try and show you that this story amounts to a gross betrayal of public trust. There is NO evidence to support this story! So let’s go through each segment. .CAUSES.Let us not question that damage or miscopying of genes can happen. It can, but it is either repaired or the cell self-destructs. So let us instead look at the idea that as a result of damage or miscopying, there is a random mutation, which goes unnoticed and which then leads to cancerous cells because this is the crux of the matter.The first hurdle is that there is no consensus as to what is meant by random. What is random? The dictionary definitions say random is something happening by chance rather than according to a plan. And just to be finicky, I will give the meaning of “by chance” as being events that occur in the absence of any cause. This is what the public understands.Some scientists seem to echo the public understanding when they say “random means anywhere throughout the genome”. But then they add that the events that occur throughout a whole chromosome arm, occur by a different mechanism to those which are focal events. And that the mechanisms are not understood. So there is the implication that random doesn’t really mean random.Then there are those scientists, who talk about random as being “random with respect to fitness”. So the events they say are calling random affect genes that have to do with fitness. And many seem to equate fitness with being able to divide faster than other cells!But though they claims these events are not understood they still insist that they are unguided. So random means random? Well.. no, not exactly because other scientists insist that they are random, but that there are hot spots in the genome!”Let’s examine this problem of random unguided but with hot spots or what some are calling “biased chance” or “directed chance”, with respect to mutagenesis because “chemicals that cause mutations” are the villains that they frighten us with.To test for chemicals that cause mutations, the Ames test is used! Here, in my opinion, the treachery begins. They have tested thousands of chemicals and many thousands are found to cause mutations. But what does this really mean?.They have used bacteria, which have a controller gene turned off. This controller gene or switch if you like, needs to be turned on for the bacterial to be able to synthesis histidine. And all the genes, which are necessary, already exist in the bacteria t make their own histidine. Histidine is necessary for metabolism. So these bacteria are given a little histidine in the culture medium to begin with, together with the chemical to be tested.If the chemical causes mutations, then after the incubation period, the control gene or switch is found to have turned on, so that the bacteria can now transcribe the gene necessary to make their own histidine. This is called a mutation or change. Ah but it’s random.. the event is unguided but the mechanism is not understood and in any case the switch gene just happens to be a hot spot! And the same mutation happened for all the thousands of chemicals that were then named mutagens. I don’t know about you but this made my head spin.I suggested to some medical researchers that the bacteria, under stressful conditions, possibly life threatening conditions, had turn on a gene, which controls transcription of the histidine gene downstream… well, my utterance was sacrilege! I needed to go wash my mouth out with soap. One researcher in the field of cancer research called me “a f*****g idiot”! While another said I was spouting dangerous information. And I was promptly told that in every case it was a random mutation.Random? Really, in the same spot for thousands of chemicals? WOW!Let’s move on to the tests for carcinogenesis. Here too, the reasoning would leave even a mathematician’s head spinning in confusion.The chemical tested, they say, finds its way across the cell membrane, without doing any damage.. And remember there are special receptors on cell membranes, which are the only way any chemicals can get in or out of a cell. But they get in and not only that, they get into the inner sanctum.. into the nucleus! And though the DNA is inside chromosomes that need to be unwound, but here again magically they find the hot spots. These are “biased chance”, i.e., random changes but only get the hot spots, which in reality can only be accessed when the DNA unwinds for replication or the copying of some gene to make a protein. Hey.. minor detail!So if the mutagen is to be called a carcinogen then it must target those hot spots, which they claim just happen to be those genes that control the cell cycle. These are the genes, which have conveniently been named proto-oncogenes and tumour suppressor genes. Never mind that they have nothing to do with cancer and are only about cell division.From there the story literally becomes a fairy tale.. “It is believed that… and they go on to use imagination.. “the cell begins to grow out of control and accumulates more and more mutations and blah, blah, blah”. There is no evidence. No experiment has ever been done, which shows a mechanism, understood or not, which might be called carcinogenesis. NONE!The story is justified either by saying that “no one fully understands the processes involved” or that the processes are “poorly understood”. So having reached this stage, they invoke, who else, but Darwin. “The abnormal cell survives”, I was told “because it has become more fit than its neighbours!” And becoming more fit, it is naturally selected! And of course, as they are saying dividing out of control, then the reasoning is that there have to be more and more random mutations, with each cell division. Thus they get the reasoning of “the foot to the metal and the brakes broken”. So they imagine more and more abnormal cells must appear.This fantasy is called the cancer clonal evolutionary theory. It is an untested and unverified hypothesis only. And it is justified by sorting the identified cancer genes into two groups and saying that some have “driver mutations” and others “passenger mutations” so that they can then call it a disease of the regulation of tissue growthLittle wonder why Darwinian evolutionary theory is pushed so hard. There’s money in it. Evolutionary theory has random unguided processes that lead to new phenotypes. And in cancer there are new phenotypes, cells that look different. They do look down their microscopes and see cells that look different to any and all other cells in the body.. what we call normal cells. However they have no evidence as to how those cells got there nor by what mechanism nor why.The idea of cancer as abnormal cells dividing out of control conveniently justifies the artefacts that they create in mice and other animals in the laboratories and which are used to test drugs. However they know, and have known for a long time now, for at least two decades or more, that cancer is NOT a mass of abnormal cells at all. But let me not get ahead of myself!I do want to say though, that there is evidence for the “growing out of control” to be untrue. For instance many prostate cancers can exist, without the man’s knowledge even unto old age and an unrelated death. So wherefore can we say “abnormal cells multiplying out of control”?Even more generally, they are saying it takes upwards of 5 or 6 years and upto 20 or 30 years to develop cancer. At a rapid rate of uncontrolled cell division such a cancer would be huge. Consider it takes 9 months to go from zygote (the single cells created when a sperm enters an ovum) to a newborn infant, and that is only 3.5Kg. In ten years it would rival the size of an adult human!“So, Kyrani”, you may ask, “are you saying scientists are in some sort of conspiracy?”I don’t think so, but they are bound in a way that may amount to as much, though not of their own free will. Here I will tell you about something I overheard when I worked as a laboratory assistance to put myself through university. I should first mention that here in Australia there is no class distinctions. In the tea room a full professor, or lecturer, or research officer etc., sits alongside laboratory staff, including laboratory assistants and even cleaners sometimes if they happen to come for tea at the same time.Anyway, I was seated at one of the long narrow tables with my cup of coffee and a book and opposite me were two senior researchers. As I opened my book, I heard the one say to the other “I don’t know how I am going to word this to get the funding?” He was worried about how he would word his research grant application, to get his research funds. So together they proceeded to discuss the different ways the application might be worded. Finally, having found the right wording, the adviser gave a word of caution to his colleague. He advised how to write his research paper for publication once he’d finished his research. He said “don’t mention this or that.. let the reader read between the lines”. Then the first one said something like “yeah, yeah I know, I know.. ha, ha, I won’t get published if I said X and Y.”My ears buzzed as I stared hard at the pages of my book. I had been lead to believe that one could do whatever research one was interested in, that no one told you what you had to do or could not do. And as for the final research paper, surely it would detail all of the findings. So then I understood that the way “they” waved the magic, discriminating wand, was through the funding. And of course the “they” are the drug companies, who fund all research, whether through the front door or through the back door. There is no conspiracy, just straight jackets!So, let’s see how effective those straight jackets can be.In January 2000 Weinberg and Hanahan published what has been heralded as a milestone paper called The Hallmarks of Cancer. It outlined 6 key features that supposedly describe what make a cancer, a cancer.Let us now look at these “malignant” features a bit more closely.Feature #1. Cancer cells have self-sufficiency in growth signals OR sustaining proliferative signalling.An alternative way of saying this is requiring only internal signals to proliferate so can. proliferate, without external signals from other cells.Feature #2. being evading anti-growth signals OR insensitive to growth suppressorsAn alternative way of saying this is that they that they can downregulate cell division.Feature #3. Cancer cells can evade apoptosis OR resist cell death.An alternative way of saying this is that they can prevent or block apoptotic cell death.Feature #4. Cancer cells are enabling replicative immortalityAn alternative way of saying this is having unlimited self-renewal capability.Feature #5. Cancer cells have sustained angiogenesis OR can induce angiogenesis.An alternative way of saying this is ability to promote angiogenesis.Feature #6. Invasion and metastasisAn alternative way of saying this is the ability for a single cell or group of cells to migrate to another area.***********************These 6 malignant features then spurred a flurry of research. And a race began to find the bio-chemical factors and the genes concerned to create patentable target therapies.Then in 2011 they added four more hallmarks to the list. So there are now 10 hallmarks of cancer. These new ones are:Feature #7. Cancer cells evade immune destruction or have immune-editing capability,An alternative way of saying this is having immunomodulatory effects.Feature #8. Caner cells have altered cellular energetics,An alternative way of saying this is the ability to regulate metabolic pathways.Feature #9. cancer-enabling inflammation, OR tumour promoting inflammation.An alternative way of saying this is initiation of cytokines and other immune system products.Feature #10. cancer-enabling genetic instability OR genome instability and mutation..An alternative way of saying this is able to make changes in genetic expression.The hallmarks of cancer are supposed to be all of those malignant properties that make cancer cells cancerous. Right?Well GUESS WHAT!These are none other than THE HALLMARKS OF STEM CELLS!Yes, because the ALTERNATIVE WAYS OF SAYING these properties reveal the properties of stem cells.You don’t believe me? Here is a selection of papers to show the evidence. See it for yourself.About FEATURE 1 & 2.http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/content/66/9/4553Normal Stem Cells and Cancer Stem Cells: The Niche MattersThe balance between proliferation-inhibiting and proliferation-promoting signals is the key to homeostatic regulation of stem cell maintenance versus tissue regeneration.About FEATURE #3Hematopoietic stem cells (HSC) need two signals to prevent apoptosis; BCL-2 can provide one of these, Kitl/c-Kit signaling the other.Here is a study of HSC done in mice https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11120768 with no mention of cancer. It is all about stem cells. Published in the Journal of Experimental Medicine in 2000 Dec 18th.And wouldn’t you know it? BCL-2 has been named a proto-oncogene!About FEATURE #4https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_the_difference_between_self-renewal_and_normal_cell_division“stem cell immortality is thanks to the expression of the enzyme telomerase”.About FEATURE #5https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867400000258A Role for Hematopoietic Stem Cells in Promoting AngiogenesisAbout FEATURE #6https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4457291/Cell Migration“This article is organized in two main sections. The first section is devoted to the single-cell migrating in isolation such as occurs when leukocytes migrate during the immune response or when fibroblasts squeeze through connective tissue. The second section is devoted to cells collectively migrating as part of multicellular clusters or sheets. This second type of migration is prevalent in development, wound healing, and in some forms of cancer metastasis.”About Feature #7.https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23931061Immunomodulatory effects of stem cells.“Mesenchymal stem cells identified from various dental tissues, including periodontal ligament stem cells, also possess multipotent and immunomodulatory properties.”About Feature #8.http://pubmedcentralcanada.ca/pmcc/articles/PMC2837789/GLYCOLYTIC NETWORK RESTRUCTURING INTEGRAL TO THE ENERGETICS OF EMBRYONIC STEM CELL CARDIAC DIFFERENTIATION.About Feature #9Inflammation & MSCs - Premier Regenerative | Stem Cell Therapy“MSCs (mesenchymal stem cell) do not just behave like stem cells, but also like micro scale drug stores/hospitals for injured”And this…http://www.woundsresearch.com/article/mesenchymal-stem-cells-guardians-inflammation“The immunomodulatory function of an MSC is one of its most powerful characteristics. It can augment and modulate both the adaptive and innate immune responses as it pertains to the wound healing paradigm.”About Feature #10https://news.yale.edu/2012/11/18/skin-cells-reveal-dna-s-genetic-mosaic“The prevailing wisdom has been that every cell in the body contains identical DNA. However, a new study of stem cells derived from the skin has found that genetic variations are widespread in the body’s tissues, a finding with profound implications for genetic screening, according to Yale School of Medicine researchers.”******************************The wording used to describe the NORMAL stem cells and their functions, from germ cells to embryonic stem cells to adult stem cells, I would say have been hi-jacked by the researchers. And I say hi-jacked because most of this was known in 2000. Indeed cancer was already recognised as having stem cells in 1997, three years before Hannahan and Weinberg “brainstormed” the hallmarks..They surely knew about stem cells and even about stem cells and cancer. Cancer stem cells were first identified by John Dick in acute myeloid leukaemia in the late 1990s BEFORE . Weinberg and Hannahan first met. By that stage stem cells had been studied for twenty years.1978: Stem cells were discovered in human cord blood1981: First in vitro stem cell line developed from mice1988: Embryonic stem cell lines created from a hamster1995: First embryonic stem cell line derived from a primate1997: Cloned lamb from stem cells1997: Leukaemia origin found as haematopoietic stem cell, indicating possible proof of cancer stem cellsAll the dark language is only a menacing way of describing normal stem cell properties! Ah but, stated as the hallmarks of cancer they can justify the development of drugs to fight the cancer. But the drugs are really anti stem cell drugs and potentially dangerous.Why not consider the application of these properties instead? Cancer stem cells are stem cells applying their capabilities in a novel way. Why?BUT WAIT, THERE IS MORE!Cancer is recognised as an organ, though some have called it a rogue organ.http://jcs.biologists.org/content/125/23/5591.longAbstract.“Cancers are not just masses of malignant cells but complex ‘rogue’ organs, to which many other cells are recruited and can be corrupted by the transformed cells. Interactions between malignant and non-transformed cells create the tumor microenvironment (TME)”.This is quite an admission, even though the authors are still trying to tease out everything so as to be able to say everything consistent with the official story.So while cancer is recognised as an organ (complete with basal membrane a rich microenvironment, its own blood supply etc.,) they are still chasing around talking about “cancer cells in the micro environment with normal cells”. Why?The reality is that scientists have to study cancer in the context of therapeutic strategies. That is the research that gets the funding. This is where the profits are to be made. So they talk about copy number profiles of certain genes and the notion of driver and passenger mutations and so on. That is like trying to understand what someone is saying to you by doing a statistical analysis of the words they use.To understand you need to appreciate gramma and meaning, not how many words are used and how many commas and full stops there were etc. and draw graphs. Cancers are organs so why not study the genetics in that context. Ask the question why is the body generating such novel organs? For what purpose?Wait a minute.. what about the doctors? Wouldn’t the doctors speak up?Here again the drug companies play their cards well. They fund and thus control the medical schools and thus the doctors’ education. They also control what a doctor can say and do once they have graduated because there are set out guidelines as to what is a disease and what is treatment.. the so-called “standard of care”.Failure to follow the guidelines or to challenge them can result in losing their medical ticket or, do some time in jail… if they are lucky. Or they might just get cancer and die, if they are unlucky. I look at Dr Chris O’Brien and his medical centre for patients to have access to alternative medicine in the same building as conventional medicine. What was he thinking? He suddenly got aggressive brain cancer and died, even before the building was complete. And he is not the only one, though some survive and some don’t.Another example is the researcher Dr Elizabeth Targ, who made a significant contribution is the use of prayer in distant healing, She too got brain cancer. And yes, many prayed for her. But some of the distant healers she would have been faced with would have prayed for her to “get well soon!” And had her agreement on that! BUT what “well” did they mean? No doubt, the hole in the ground! She died too and there are many others like her suffered the same fate or a little cancer brought them into line. This brings us to the subject of how a cancer market is propagated.But first let me say, the doctors are not in control of their own profession. They are in fact controlled, but the straight jackets are not obvious.. not when they have to accept the official story that the disease is rogue cells out of control, and which the patient brought on themselves or else…..But if they toe the line, then the industry is self-preserving. Why? Well because the treatment never fails! If the patient is adversely affected or dies, the doctors are not at fault. It is the patient’s fault. “The patient”, it is said, “has failed the standard of care”. Not that the standard of care killed them and the doctors should be held for questioning. People can be simply brought to believe that “the patient’s body did not respond well to the drugs”! So if a patient dies of say, chemo, the doctor’s cosy. Death by medicine is the third leading cause of death in the U.S of A! How many doctors are held responsible? None!So how does cancer come about? Because there is no evidence that cancer is due to physical causes. And before I go on I want to give two reasons here.One reason is that all of the research that has been done in the laboratory does not provide any evidence of physical causes. All the tumours created are artefacts.Firstly, the mice model tumours do not evolve naturally. The initiating event is generally an engineered mutation and it is present throughout a tissue. The natural tumour arises from a single cell.Secondly, they look to study the combined action of many genes at the same time. These genes are usually simultaneously mutated. Natural tumour development is a multi-step process.Thirdly, many mouse models are designed to give rapid-onset & high-penetrance to keep costs down. (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3880436/ ) As a result they do not possess the co-operating tumour forming events of a naturally evolving tumour.And finally they do not fully have the behaviour of a tumour growing or originating from within an organism. The reason is that there are no characteristic features of the tumour microenvironment, such as stromal cells, vasculature and immune cells.The other reason is that cancer is not just a mass of abnormal cells. Cancer is an organ. And they have not demonstrated that amount of damage and miscopied genes can give rise to a new and novel organ. Furthermore any such action is that of stem cells. Are we to accept that stem cells can be created out of damage or miscopied genes, uncontrolled cell division and the accumulation of tens of thousands of random mutations, even if they had the biased chance that they claim!So the more intelligent question to ask is, why would the body develop a new organ? And if there is no evidence of there being a physical cause, can it possibly be a nocebo effect?A nocebo is an adverse bodily reaction to ideas, perceptions and beliefs, which indicate some possible problem. And here there is evidence of the nocebo effect, but not only is it being swept under the proverbial carpet. Any research in this direction is outlawed as unethical. They have done some horrific experiments, in my opinion to get the “it unethical” argument, when in reality it is not profitable.What is nocebo? This was well demonstrated back in the days when chemotherapy drugs were tested against a dummy drug, i.e., sugar or flour or a saline solution. This showed stark evidence of the nocebo effect.Those in the control arm, who got the dummy drug, had some of the same symptoms as those in the intervention arm, who got the real drug. One of those symptoms was that their hair fell out!The subjects in the intervention arm had lost their hair owing to the toxicity of the real drug, which damaged fast growing cells and hence the cells at the roots of their hair. So their hair fell out.In contrast, the subject in the control arm had lost their hair owing to a nocebo effects. A person, who enters a drug trial is desperate. They see the drug trial as possibly their last hope. They want to believe that they have been given a real drug, which they hope will help them get well. And they know that the real drug damages the roots of the recipient’s hair.Choosing to believe that they have the real drug they will also believe that there will be damage to the roots of their hair. This sparks an immune response. The inflammatory response, of the immune system damages their healthy hair follicles and their hair falls out. Such is the power of a belief!From my own private research and findings, I would describe cancer as stem cell mediated immunity, erroneously ignited in the body owing to false beliefs. And I found that it is totally reversible by the body when either the erroneous beliefs are seen for what they are and discarded or when any ongoing emotional reactivity is brought to a halt by addressing any ongoing issues. Both these actions are preferable to ensure a spontaneous remission.It is impossible here to describe in detail how person’s reaction to a belief gives rise to cancer. (If you are interested you can read my blog https://victory-over-cancer.quora.com/ )The ugly truth is that there is foul game play behind cancer. The person targeted by those related to him or her in some way (relative, friend, co-worker) have an agenda. For example they may want to gain power and influence so as to manipulate and control the person or take revenge etc.. The aim of the foul game play is to lead an unsuspecting person to react as to unwittingly bring about adverse bodily reactivity.This adverse bodily reactivity has one of two aims. One is to build a protective barrier against a possible threat or danger. The other is to build a resistance front against some perceived hostile force.But of course the only barrier the body can build is a cell barrier. Thus the person’s reaction to a belief of possible harm or the perception of some resistive force, is to develop cancer.This can explain why stem cells in the body, change their genetic expression as to form a different type of stem cells, which can give rise to a multitude of different cells, create a defining outer organ membrane, initiate neovascularization (new blood vessels) and communicate with the other cells in the microenvironment, including the immune system cells.And what about so many genetic changes? This too has been demonstrated as part of nature and as a response to challenges in the environment, a long time ago, albeit in the physical environment!Firstly there is, in 1948: Barbara McClintock’s discovery of transposons or transposable elements in maize plants. These are chromosome breakage, transposon-mediated mutations (changes). They came to be called “jumping genes”. Not as part of any disease, but as the response of the genome to challenge naturally occurring in the plants’ environment. Genes could not only move, but could also be turned on or off owing to challenging environmental conditions or during different stages of cell development.McClintock’s work was dismissed and rejected for 30 years because it contested the accepted genetic theory of the time. Scientists believed that genes were fixed in their position on the chromosome. However some twenty years later others found the same effects in bacteria and Drosophila melanogaster (flies).McClintock also showed that gene mutations can be reversed. She published her discoveries in the Journal “Genetics” in 1953.She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for her discovery of mobile genetic elements, but not for another thirty years after!It is accepted now that approximately 90% of the maize genome is made up of TEs or transposable elements and 44% of the human genome! However her work and findings are absent from any articles on cancer! Why?Secondly, we see all the remarkable properties and changes in the development of the embryo. None of it is new. The only difference is that this is happening in the body after development. However if it was researched in this way, we might find ways of restoring damaged organs in situ and restoring lost limbs etc., Ah but wouldn’t that hurt the transplant industry and how could they sell all those prostheses?It is an ugly truth that hides behind cancer but one that can free you and put you in control of your health. A person can effect a spontaneous remission of their cancer because the development of the cancer is their own reaction. No one else can “cause you cancer” or “give you cancer” or “make you have cancer”, though the inhumane people in the person’s life entertain such ideas. Being a person’s own reaction, they only need to realise that the belief was phoney.. a manufacture created out of a concealed threat and mental suggestions that seem like their own ideas. Once they stop reacting the body reverses the changes.. spontaneous remission… the cancer is gone.I said, near the beginning, that the means, by which disease manifests, cancer in this case, can be encouraged and supported, even promoted. So how?I see three main areas.One area is that the concerns of a cancer patient are attributed to the diagnosis only and anything else is rejected. I recall back in the 1960s when there were two people, one of which I knew and another I was told about, both had concerns about the people around them. Their concerns were that some of the people wanted to do them harm. I later read an article about others, cancer patients in hospitals, having the same concerns. What happened to them? Why a psychiatrist was called in, who would declare them delusional or paranoid and would drug them. Of course this spelt their end so much faster.Since then I have come to realise that psychiatry is indeed political. But it is not the politics of the nation. Rather it has to do with the politics of two key groups.One is the inhumane subculture, without which the elitists who want a New World Order would have no ability to sell the propaganda they want to sell and do jobs like 9/11. And no, they do not “leak” because to leak information is to unmask and that is not in their interests because they lose all credibility as respected citizens in society.The other group is the medical industrial complex, who profit from disease, with cancer being one of the most profitable. Without the hateful actions of inhumane people and the foul game play there would be no cancer and thus no profits. Psychiatrists protect the medical industry by discrediting the concerns of the patient, which point to foul game play.The second area is in parapsychology. For every parapsychologist, who tries to do genuine research, there are many others, who do the research with conditions that deny ESP and especially telepathy. The funding of course comes from the medical industrial complex. The net effect is for people to doubt the reality of extrasensory perception and telepathy in particular. This ensures that the essential element of the foul game play is is protected and shielded from public view. Thus the pitfall is secured.The third area is the continual promotion of things in the environment being carcinogenic, when there is no evidence. Some people speak about everything from foods to mobile phones etc., as being possible carcinogens, out of concern and really out of ignorance and in the belief in what they hear. However I would say that many of the people talking about how everything around us and the food we eat etc., causes cancer, are inhumane people. And promotion is not limited to non-medical media. All of the medical media sites, official and government organisations promote the idea of physical causes for cancer. And there is an ever growing list, which causes fear in the hearts of many.The belief in carcinogens, even the doubt about something may be carcinogenic, is enough to be used in foul game play. It becomes child’s play for an inhumane person related to the targeted person to deceive them because the targeted person has already been given the beliefs needed by recognised medical experts. And remember the doctors are bound to toe the line.Thus markets are created and an ever increasing incidence of cancer can be ensured. This is war, but unlike the type that the military industrial complex benefits from, this is a quiet war, where the victims are bludgeoned if they speak up. And a narrative is forged such that the victims are not able to obtain the moral support of humane people around them, who could and would give them the support they need to easily win against the foul game play.So, yes, cancer is a business and it is very, very dirty. BUT we can put an end to that business!