Vitamin C in leukemia and preleukemia cell growth.

Vitamin C was shown to be an essential requirement for the growth of mouse myeloma cells in an in vitro colony assay. Human leukemia (acute nonlymphocytic leukemia) cell colonies grow well in a similar in vitro culture system, and vitamin C has been shown to enhance the growth of leukemic cell colonies in 77 (35%) of 219 leukemic patients while none of 34 normal bone marrows tested simultaneously shows growth enhancement by this vitamin. This vitamin C effect is reproducible in repeated experiments in same patients, specific to this vitamin, selective for leukemic cells, and is proven to be biological in nature. Further, leukemic cells are mobilized back and forth between cycling and resting states with vitamin C supplementation/depletion. Our more recent study indicates that the preleukemia (myelodysplastic syndrome), generally known to be related to acute nonlymphocytic leukemia, has similar pattern in terms of vitamin C sensitivity, with 8 of 25 patients (32%) showing the growth enhancement with this vitamin.