HN: I simulated a real cancer case and predicted why some tumors didn’t respond

Resonance — Emergent Life Simulation Engine

Simulation engine where life, evolution, and therapeutic strategies emerge from 8 axioms and 4 fundamental constants. Built with Rust and Bevy 0.15 ECS. Open source (AGPL-3.0).

Paper: https://zenodo.org/records/19342036 | Repo: https://github.com/ResakaGit/RESONANCE

What It Does

Define the laws of physics. Press play. Watch life emerge. Design therapeutic strategies from first principles.

• 10-level biological hierarchy — from energy fields to social emergence, all emergent
• Pathway-level drug design — inhibit specific metabolic pathways without killing cells
• Adaptive therapy controller — profiles tumor, selects frequency + dose, stabilizes growth at zero
• Bozic 2013 validated — combination > monotherapy, confirmed 10/10 independent seeds
• Clinically calibrated — output in nM, days, cell count (3 tumor profiles from published data)
• 3,113 automated tests — deterministic, bit-exact reproducible

What It Is NOT

• Not a clinical tool — not validated against patient outcomes
• Not a drug discovery pipeline — does not design molecules
• Not a substitute for oncology — a simulator for exploring therapeutic strategies

Clinically calibrated — simulation output maps to real units (nM, days, cell count) via published data. Three tumor profiles: CML/imatinib (Bozic 2013), prostate/abiraterone (Gatenby 2009), NSCLC/erlotinib. Example: “399 Hz @ 0.40, gen 3” → “Imatinib 104 nM, start day 12, doubling time 4 → 7.5 days.”

The 8 Axioms

The 4 Fundamental Constants

All ~40 lifecycle constants are algebraically derived from these 4 via derived_thresholds.rs. Zero hardcoded values.

Validated Results

Experiment 4: Pathway Inhibition

Drug reduces metabolic efficiency without killing cells. Dose-response validated across 10 independent seeds.

Experiment 5: Bozic 2013 Validation

Combination therapy advantage confirmed (10/10 seeds, p < 0.001):

Experiment 6: Adaptive Therapy Controller

Feedback loop stabilizes tumor growth at zero net expansion:

Gen 0-2:  No treatment. Efficiency 1.000.
Gen 3:    Controller starts: 399 Hz @ 0.40.
Gen 4:    Efficiency drops to 0.575 (42.5% suppression).
Gen 5+:   STABLE. Growth rate = 0.000. Tumor controlled.
Protocol: "399 Hz @ 0.40, maintain from gen 3"

Validated across 10 seeds: stabilizes in ≥7/10, suppresses in ≥7/10.

Calibrated Output (CML/imatinib)

Experiment 7: Rosie Case (Canine Mast Cell Tumor)

Simulation of a real-world case: personalized mRNA cancer vaccine for a dog (press reports, March 2026). Tumor profile: 70% KIT+ responsive, 30% KIT- resistant. Calibrated with published veterinary oncology data (London 2003, London 2009).

Validated across 5 seeds. Partial response is structural, not stochastic.

Calibrated (canine mast cell): 21-day doubling, toceranib IC50 = 40 nM as pharmacological proxy (not mechanism equivalent — toceranib is a kinase inhibitor, the real vaccine is immune-mediated), ~10⁸ cells.

Known limitations of this simulation:

• Efficiency reduction ≠ tumor volume reduction (we measure metabolic suppression, not cell death)
• 70/30 KIT+/KIT- split is from population-level prevalence (London 2003), not Rosie’s individual tumor
• No immune system modeled — vaccine is simulated as direct pathway inhibitor, not immune-mediated response
• Frequency is a computational proxy for genetic identity, not a measured biological observable
• The partial response pattern matches but the underlying mechanism differs (direct inhibition vs T-cell mediated killing)

DISCLAIMER: Simulated from press reports. NOT peer-reviewed data. NOT veterinary advice.

Clinical Calibration Profiles

Scientific Validation Summary

Biological Hierarchy (10 levels, all emergent)

Quick Start

cargo run                                          # Default demo
cargo run --release --bin adaptive_therapy         # Adaptive therapy controller (~8 sec)
cargo run --release --bin bozic_validation          # Bozic 2013 5-arm validation (~95 sec)
cargo run --release --bin pathway_inhibitor         # Pathway inhibition (~6 sec)
cargo run --release --bin cancer_therapy            # Level 1 cytotoxic
cargo run --release --bin lab                       # Universal dashboard
cargo run --release --bin survival -- --seed 42     # Play as evolved creature
RESONANCE_MAP=earth cargo run --release             # Earth simulation

Tests

cargo test --release    # 3,113 tests (113K LOC, ~36 sec)
cargo bench             # batch + bridge benchmarks

Architecture

src/
├── blueprint/equations/    Pure math (50+ files, 0 side effects)
│   ├── pathway_inhibitor.rs   Drug design: 14 fns, 42 tests
│   ├── derived_thresholds.rs  4 constants → ~40 thresholds
│   └── ...                    protein_fold, metabolic_genome, coulomb, etc.
├── batch/                  Headless simulator (NO Bevy, rayon parallel)
├── layers/                 14 ECS layers
├── simulation/             9 active emergence systems, 7 implemented not registered
├── use_cases/experiments/  6 validated experiments
└── bin/                    25 executables

Documentation

Regulatory Status

RESONANCE is a research tool, not a medical device. Voluntary compliance documentation exists for credibility and partnership readiness.

Disclaimer: This documentation is voluntary best-practice, not regulatory obligation. RESONANCE is not FDA-cleared, CE-marked, or approved for clinical use. See INTENDED_USE.md and LIMITATIONS_REPORT.md.

CI/CD

Every push to main and every PR runs 5 automated checks:

cargo check    — compilation
cargo test     — 3,113 tests
cargo clippy   — zero warnings
cargo audit    — no known CVEs
cargo fmt      — formatting

Branch protection requires PR + CI pass + review before merge.

Requirements

• Rust 1.85+ (edition 2024)
• macOS / Linux / Windows
• No GPU required (headless mode available)

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md for development workflow, coding rules, and how to submit changes.

Security

See SECURITY.md for vulnerability reporting policy.

License

AGPL-3.0 — Free to use, study, modify, and distribute. Copyright (c) 2026 Augusto Gomez Saa. See LICENSE.