title: Give it or take it: the flux of one-carbon in cancer cells.
abstract: The sequence of the human genome together with sequence similarity analyses has advanced the discovery of missing steps in the mitochondrial one-carbon metabolism pathway. That together with the revived interest in cancer metabolism has brought the research on one-carbon metabolism back under the spotlight. Here, we present a brief review of recent advances in the field of one-carbon metabolism, with a bias towards its relevance to cell growth and proliferation in human cancers. We will address the requirements of one-carbon metabolism for biosynthesis and the major sources to satisfy that demand. We will also discuss some recent discoveries indicating a role of one-carbon metabolism beyond biosynthesis. We conclude with a concise enumeration of some fundamental questions that remain unanswered.
authors.affiliation: Cancer Research UK Beatson Institute, Glasgow, UK.
authors.forename: Johannes
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Meiser
authors.affiliation: Cancer Research UK Beatson Institute, Glasgow, UK. a.vazquez@beatson.gla.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Alexei
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Vazquez
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002244:Carbon / Q000378:metabolism*; D057486:Carbon Cycle; D002451:Cell Compartmentation; D003600:Cytosol / Q000378:metabolism; D047108:Embryonic Development; D005998:Glycine / Q000378:metabolism; D006801:Humans; D053858:Metabolic Networks and Pathways; D008745:Methylation; D008928:Mitochondria / Q000378:metabolism; D008954:Models, Biological; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000378:metabolism*; D012694:Serine / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D012694:Serine; D002244:Carbon; D005998:Glycine
keywords: cancer metabolism; cell growth; folate metabolism; mitochondria metabolism; one-carbon metabolism