Warburg Paved Way For Today’s Cancer Research
May 21, 2018 at 2:23 p.m.
By Max [email protected]
Warburg’s contributions to cancer research have become more widely accepted and continue to grow even though he died almost 50 years ago. He may have been the greatest biochemist of the 20th century. New insights into how cancer cells grow stem from Warburg's early work and have opened novel possibilities for treatment.
In the 1920s, Warburg and his colleagues discovered that cancer cells consume larger amounts of glucose (blood sugar) than normal cells. Glucose is the body's preferred energy source. (Table sugar or sucrose contains both fructose and glucose.) To generate energy from glucose, cells use one of two pathways: One of them takes place in the energy-producing structures inside cells (mitochondria), and the second method is called fermentation. Normal cells use the path in the mitochondria, but about 80 percent of cancer cells seem to have revamped their metabolism to generate energy with fermentation. This phenomenon is known as the Warburg effect.
An article published in Science several years ago described the difference between normal and cancer cells. Normal cells take up nutrients from their environment when stimulated by growth factors. Cancer cells, on the other hand, acquire genetic mutations that alter the metabolic processes. These mutations result in the ability to utilize glucose to meet the demands for cell growth and reproduction just like the process of fermentation described by Louis Pasteur much earlier.
Warburg found that unlike most normal tissues, cancer cells tend to "ferment" glucose into lactate and obtain the required energy needed for survival. He also proposed that cancer cells develop a defect in mitochondria that leads to impaired aerobic (the need for oxygen) metabolism.
It should be understood that mitochondria are the power generators residing in our living cells and that by using oxygen to burn food, they produce all the energy we need to live and support growth. There are usually hundreds or thousands of them in a single cell, and mitochondria are present in every cell of the body with the exception of red blood cells.
Background
Otto Warburg was born on Oct. 8, 1883, in Germany. His father was famous physicist Emil Warburg.
Otto Warburg studied chemistry and was awarded a Doctor of Chemistry degree in 1906. He then studied medicine and obtained the degree Doctor of Medicine in 1911. He served in the Prussian Guard in World War 1 with distinction. (When Warburg enlisted in the army, Albert Einstein sent him a letter urging him to come home for the sake of science.)
Warburg's early research was in botany, studying the assimilation of carbon dioxide in plants. He went on to study the metabolism of tumors, and the chemical constituent of oxygen transfer during fermentation. For his discovery of the nature and mode of action of the respiratory enzyme, he won the Nobel Prize in 1931. (He was considered for the award on at least two other occasions.) This discovery opened up new ways in the fields of cellular metabolism and respiration. He showed for the first time that cancerous cells can live and develop, even in the absence of oxygen. This research at the time was hailed as a major breakthrough in understanding cancer, but was largely neglected through the years and unpublished in textbooks.
It should be noted that Warburg's work was conducted in Germany, despite the fact that Warburg was Jewish, an indication of how important cancer research was in that country. Cancer was more prevalent in Germany than in almost any other nation. While he was in the laboratory, other members of his faith were being persecuted or awaiting death in Nazi concentration camps.
Through the years it became more obvious that cancer cells were hungry for glucose. His discovery, later named the Warburg effect, has been found to occur in up to 80 percent of cancers. It is so fundamental to most cancers that positron emission tomography (PET) scans, which have emerged as an important tool in diagnosing cancer, work simply by revealing the places in the body where cells are consuming extra glucose. In many cases, the more glucose a tumor consumes, the worse the diagnosis.
Warburg, who died in 1970, is no longer a footnote in history. Scientists now believe that that it will be possible to slow or even stop tumors by disrupting one or more of the chemical reactions a cell uses to reproduce, and, in the process, starve cancer cells of the nutrients they need to grow.
Max Sherman is a medical writer and pharmacist retired from the medical device industry. He has taught college courses on regulatory and compliance issues at Ivy Tech, Grace College and Butler University. Sherman has an unquenchable thirst for knowledge on all levels. Eclectic Science, the title of his column, will touch on famed doctors and scientists, human senses, aging, various diseases, and little-known facts about many species, including their contributions to scientific research. He can be reached by email at [email protected].
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Warburg’s contributions to cancer research have become more widely accepted and continue to grow even though he died almost 50 years ago. He may have been the greatest biochemist of the 20th century. New insights into how cancer cells grow stem from Warburg's early work and have opened novel possibilities for treatment.
In the 1920s, Warburg and his colleagues discovered that cancer cells consume larger amounts of glucose (blood sugar) than normal cells. Glucose is the body's preferred energy source. (Table sugar or sucrose contains both fructose and glucose.) To generate energy from glucose, cells use one of two pathways: One of them takes place in the energy-producing structures inside cells (mitochondria), and the second method is called fermentation. Normal cells use the path in the mitochondria, but about 80 percent of cancer cells seem to have revamped their metabolism to generate energy with fermentation. This phenomenon is known as the Warburg effect.
An article published in Science several years ago described the difference between normal and cancer cells. Normal cells take up nutrients from their environment when stimulated by growth factors. Cancer cells, on the other hand, acquire genetic mutations that alter the metabolic processes. These mutations result in the ability to utilize glucose to meet the demands for cell growth and reproduction just like the process of fermentation described by Louis Pasteur much earlier.
Warburg found that unlike most normal tissues, cancer cells tend to "ferment" glucose into lactate and obtain the required energy needed for survival. He also proposed that cancer cells develop a defect in mitochondria that leads to impaired aerobic (the need for oxygen) metabolism.
It should be understood that mitochondria are the power generators residing in our living cells and that by using oxygen to burn food, they produce all the energy we need to live and support growth. There are usually hundreds or thousands of them in a single cell, and mitochondria are present in every cell of the body with the exception of red blood cells.
Background
Otto Warburg was born on Oct. 8, 1883, in Germany. His father was famous physicist Emil Warburg.
Otto Warburg studied chemistry and was awarded a Doctor of Chemistry degree in 1906. He then studied medicine and obtained the degree Doctor of Medicine in 1911. He served in the Prussian Guard in World War 1 with distinction. (When Warburg enlisted in the army, Albert Einstein sent him a letter urging him to come home for the sake of science.)
Warburg's early research was in botany, studying the assimilation of carbon dioxide in plants. He went on to study the metabolism of tumors, and the chemical constituent of oxygen transfer during fermentation. For his discovery of the nature and mode of action of the respiratory enzyme, he won the Nobel Prize in 1931. (He was considered for the award on at least two other occasions.) This discovery opened up new ways in the fields of cellular metabolism and respiration. He showed for the first time that cancerous cells can live and develop, even in the absence of oxygen. This research at the time was hailed as a major breakthrough in understanding cancer, but was largely neglected through the years and unpublished in textbooks.
It should be noted that Warburg's work was conducted in Germany, despite the fact that Warburg was Jewish, an indication of how important cancer research was in that country. Cancer was more prevalent in Germany than in almost any other nation. While he was in the laboratory, other members of his faith were being persecuted or awaiting death in Nazi concentration camps.
Through the years it became more obvious that cancer cells were hungry for glucose. His discovery, later named the Warburg effect, has been found to occur in up to 80 percent of cancers. It is so fundamental to most cancers that positron emission tomography (PET) scans, which have emerged as an important tool in diagnosing cancer, work simply by revealing the places in the body where cells are consuming extra glucose. In many cases, the more glucose a tumor consumes, the worse the diagnosis.
Warburg, who died in 1970, is no longer a footnote in history. Scientists now believe that that it will be possible to slow or even stop tumors by disrupting one or more of the chemical reactions a cell uses to reproduce, and, in the process, starve cancer cells of the nutrients they need to grow.
Max Sherman is a medical writer and pharmacist retired from the medical device industry. He has taught college courses on regulatory and compliance issues at Ivy Tech, Grace College and Butler University. Sherman has an unquenchable thirst for knowledge on all levels. Eclectic Science, the title of his column, will touch on famed doctors and scientists, human senses, aging, various diseases, and little-known facts about many species, including their contributions to scientific research. He can be reached by email at [email protected].
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