Diabetes Center, First Department of Propaedeutic Internal Medicine, Medical School, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Laiko General Hospital, 17 Agiou Thoma St, 11527 Athens, Greece.
Department of Pharmacology, Medical School, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece.
Curr Med Chem. 2021;28(30):6110-6122. doi: 10.2174/0929867328666210311112240.
Cancer cells are characterized by metabolic heterogeneity. Although many research groups make efforts to analyze this heterogeneity, little attention has been paid to cancer cells utilizing otherwise unusable substrates as fuel for tumor development. Of the two stereoisomers of glucose, D-glucose but not L-glucose, the mirror image isomer of D-glucose is abundantly found in nature. D-glucose is the human body's key source of energy through aerobic respiration. However, data from in vitro and in vivo studies examining the ability of cancer cells to take up L-glucose are scarce.
The present mini-review aims to present current literature data on the role of L-glucose in cancer diagnosis based on in vitro and in vivo studies.
The MEDLINE, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Library with restrictions to articles in English language databases were searched to retrieve available data.
There are limited data in the literature regarding in vitro and in vivo studies that examined the ability of cancer cells to take up L-glucose. Research work so far has shown that that the binding of a fluorescent detector to an L-glucose molecule produced a fluorescent probe that was specifically taken up by malignant cancer cells, thus providing a unique method for their detection.
Given that L-glucose is taken up by cancer cells, L-glucose fluorescent probes can be a useful tool for visualization and characterization of cancer cells. More research on the potential biologic effects of L-glucose in cancer is necessary.
癌细胞的代谢具有异质性。尽管许多研究小组努力分析这种异质性，但很少关注癌细胞将原本不可用的底物用作肿瘤发展燃料的情况。在葡萄糖的两种立体异构体中，D-葡萄糖（D-葡萄糖的镜像异构体）而不是 L-葡萄糖在自然界中大量存在。D-葡萄糖是人体通过有氧呼吸获取能量的关键来源。然而，关于癌细胞摄取 L-葡萄糖的能力的体外和体内研究数据却很少。
本综述旨在根据体外和体内研究，介绍目前关于 L-葡萄糖在癌症诊断中作用的文献数据。
在 MEDLINE、EMBASE 和 Cochrane 图书馆中进行了限制在英文数据库中文章的检索，以获取可用数据。
关于体外和体内研究检查癌细胞摄取 L-葡萄糖能力的文献数据有限。迄今为止的研究工作表明，将荧光探测器与 L-葡萄糖分子结合产生了一种荧光探针，该探针被恶性癌细胞特异性摄取，从而为它们的检测提供了一种独特的方法。
鉴于癌细胞摄取 L-葡萄糖，L-葡萄糖荧光探针可以成为可视化和表征癌细胞的有用工具。需要进一步研究 L-葡萄糖在癌症中的潜在生物学效应。
