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    Home > Food News > Food Articles > Tumor cells don't like sugar

    Tumor cells don't like sugar

    • Last Update: 2021-04-17
    • Source: Internet
    • Author: User
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    Tumor cell

    Kimryn Rathmell, Bradley Reinfeld, Matthew Madden, and Jeffrey Rathmell (from left to right) found that immune cells, not cancer cells, are the main consumers of glucose in the tumor microenvironment.


    People know that tumors usually consume glucose at a high speed, but who loves sugar? Perhaps it is not cancer cells.


    This research has overturned the mainstream cancer metabolism model for the past 100 years.


    One of the corresponding authors of the paper, Jeffrey Rathmell, a professor of immunobiology at Vanderbilt University in the United States, said, “We now know that tumors include many types of cells.


    Observations 100 years ago

    Observations 100 years ago

    "The field of cancer metabolism has developed rapidly in the past 20 years, but it is mainly based on the observations published by Otto Warburg in 1922 that cancer cells consume glucose at a very fast rate.


    In fact, no matter what form cancer enters the human body, it starts at the cellular level and grows wildly through metabolism.


    Abe Stroock, a professor in the Smith School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, said, "Cancer has obvious metabolic characteristics, which is one of the earliest features of this type of disease found at the cellular and subcellular level.


    Nearly 100 years ago, German physiologist and Nobel laureate Warburg hypothesized that tumor growth was caused by abnormal glucose consumption by mitochondria, even under aerobic conditions.


    In fact, Warburg first speculated that cancer was a metabolic disease at that time, but subsequent research put forward the idea that genetic mutations are the root cause of cancer.


    On the other hand, when cancer cells consume glucose, they do it through a process called glycolysis, in which a large amount of glucose is converted into lactic acid.


    The Stroock team previously used flux balance analysis to determine the utilization of nutrients by a single cell during the entire metabolic process, confirming that the Warburg effect provides tumor growth advantages, but too much glutamine is not conducive to tumor cell growth.


    Stroock said: "The academic community needs to find other ways to prove the importance of glutamine.


    This time, there seems to be an answer.


    "Light up" cancer cells

    "Light up" cancer cells

    In fact, Warburg's observations have another important application-it is the basis of positron emission tomography (PET) tumor imaging.


    "For many years, I have been wondering why PET scans are not stable? Because I am studying kidney cancer.


    So two PhD students—Bradley Reinfeld in Kimryn's group and Matthew Madden in Jeffrey's group—decided to answer these questions.

    The method sounds simple: apply the PET tracer to tumor mice, isolate the tumor, use cell surface marker proteins and flow cytometry to divide the tumor into different types of cells, and measure the radioactivity in the cells.

    "China Science News" learned from Vanderbilt University that the research team used two different PET tracers, one to track glucose and one to track glutamine; and 6 different tumor models, such as colorectal cancer.
    , Kidney cancer and breast cancer models.

    The results showed that under different circumstances, myeloid immune cells (mainly macrophages) took up the highest amount of glucose, followed by T cells and cancer cells.
    In contrast, cancer cells have the highest glutamine uptake rate.

    "We think this is a common phenomenon, applicable to all types of cancer.
    " Madden said.

    No cells "lost"

    No cells "lost"

    In addition, studies have shown that certain cell signaling pathways, rather than limited nutrients, drive the difference in glucose and glutamine uptake.

    This finding contrasts with the mainstream view of metabolic competition in the tumor microenvironment.
    The latter believes that in this competition, cancer cells "win", can consume nutrients and suppress immune cells.

    The reality may be that there is no winning or losing.

    "The traditional view is that cancer cells swallow all glucose, so immune cells can't get enough glucose, making it unable to function.
    " Madden told the Chinese Journal of Science.
    "But our data shows that nutrient intake is not restricted.
    On the contrary.
    , Cells consume certain nutrients according to procedures, and they distribute nutrients on their own: cancer cells take up glutamine and fatty acids, and immune cells take up glucose.
    "

    Researchers say that knowing that cells use different nutrients in the tumor microenvironment will help people study new therapies or tumor imaging methods for specific types of cells.

    "We now have more advanced PET radiotracers, and it is time to consider testing fluorine-containing glutamine or other nutritional probes on patients.
    " Kimryn Rathmell added that these findings are also very useful for explaining FDG-PET imaging results.
    important.
    "We have been using FDG-PET scans to determine tumor response, but it may tell us the inflammatory response rather than the tumor response.
    "

    In addition, the research is an energetic and fun collaboration.
    Rathmell said that Reinfeld and Madden participated in each experiment, and they also contacted their classmates in the medical scientist training program to explore other tumor models.

    Related paper information: http://dx.
    doi.
    org/10.
    1038/s41586-021-03442-1

    http://dx.
    doi.
    org/10.
    1371/journal.
    pcbi.
    1006584

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