On the origin of cancer cells

O Warburg - Science, 1956 - science.org
O Warburg
Science, 1956science.org
Our principal experimental object for the measurement of the metabolism of cancer cells is
today no longer the tumor but the ascites cancer cells (1) living free in the abdominal cavity,
which are almost pure cultures of cancer cells with which one can work quantitatively as in
chemical analysis. Formerly, it could be said of tumors, with their varying cancer cell content,
that they ferment more strongly the more cancer cells they contain, but today we can
determine the absolute fermentation values of the can-cer cells and find such high values …
Our principal experimental object for the measurement of the metabolism of cancer cells is today no longer the tumor but the ascites cancer cells (1) living free in the abdominal cavity, which are almost pure cultures of cancer cells with which one can work quantitatively as in chemical analysis. Formerly, it could be said of tumors, with their varying cancer cell content, that they ferment more strongly the more cancer cells they contain, but today we can determine the absolute fermentation values of the can-cer cells and find such high values that we come very close to the fermentation values of wildly proliferating Torula yeasts.
What was formerly only qualitative has now become quantitative. What was formerly only probable has now become certain. The era inwhich the fermentation of the cancer cells or its importance could be disputed isover, and no one today can doubt that we understand the origin of cancer cells if we know how their large fermentation originates, or, to expressit more fully, if we know how the damaged respiration and the exces-sive fermentation of the cancer cells originate.
AAAS