Acs Research - Theorylab

You can’t attack cancer from every angle without targeting its metabolism. As Dr. Heather Christofk puts it, “cancer cells have a very different metabolism in general than most of their normal cell counterparts, and that is because most normal cells that are not dividing mainly want to use their nutrients to acquire energy. But most cancer cells want to use the nutrients they take up to build things. They use them to build more DNA and protein and lipids in order to grow and divide. “If we could come up with a way to block this altered metabolism found in cancer, we would be able to reduce the growth of the tumor, because this is fundamental—there’s no other way for the tumors to grow. “The challenge is finding the processes that are required for the tumor but not for normal tissues.” Heather Christofk, PhD, is Associate Professor of biological chemistry at UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center. 3:12 – Why is cell metabolism important? 6:30 – How is cell metabolism different in cancer cells? 8:15