Metabolic reprogramming in cancer cells: glycolysis, glutaminolysis, and Bcl-2 proteins as novel therapeutic targets for cancer
Abstract
Nearly a century ago, Otto Warburg made the ground-breaking observation that cancer cells, unlike normal cells, prefer a seemingly inefficient mechanism of glucose metabolism: aerobic glycolysis, a phenomenon now referred to as the Warburg effect. The finding that rapidly proliferating cancer cells favors incomplete metabolism of glucose, producing large amounts of lactate as opposed to synthesizing ATP to sustain cell growth, has confounded scientists for years. Further investigation into the metabolic phenotype of cancer has expanded our understanding of this puzzling conundrum, and has opened new avenues for the development of anti-cancer therapies. Enhanced glycolytic flux is now known to allow for increased synthesis of intermediates for sustaining anabolic pathways critical for cancer cell growth. Alongside the increase in glycolysis, cancer cells transform their mitochondria into synthesis machines supported by augmented glutaminolysis, supplying lipid production, amino acid synthesis, and the pentose phosphate pathways. Inhibition of several of the key enzymes involved in these pathways has been demonstrated to effectively obstruct cancer cell growth and multiplication, sensitizing them to apoptosis. The modulation of v...Continue Reading
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