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Depriving brain tumours of an amino acid could enhance chemotherapy

Glioblastoma, an aggressive brain cancer, depends on the amino acid serine as a fuel source. A serine-deficient diet has been shown to slow tumour growth in mice.
By
  1. Daniel Mobilio

    1. Daniel Mobilio is in the Centre for Discovery in Cancer Research and the Department of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario L8S 4L8, Canada, and in the McMaster Children’s Hospital, Hamilton Health Sciences, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.

  2. Sheila Singh

    1. Sheila Singh is in the Centre for Discovery in Cancer Research and the Department of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario L8S 4L8, Canada, in the McMaster Children’s Hospital, Hamilton Health Sciences, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, and in the Department of Surgery, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.

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Glioblastoma is the most aggressive and deadliest adult brain cancer, with a five-year survival rate of less than 5%1. The only treatment that has been approved in the past century is a combination of surgical removal of the tumour (resection) and chemotherapy with radiotherapy (chemoradiotherapy)2,3. Writing in Nature, Scott et al.4 investigate glioblastoma metabolism, tracing the fates of glucose-derived carbons in the tumour and surrounding healthy brain tissue. They find that glioblastoma diverts carbon towards pathways for tumour invasion and growth and scavenges the amino acid serine as an alternative carbon source. This cancer-specific metabolic vulnerability could be exploited to starve the cancer and enhance chemoradiotherapy effectiveness.

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doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-025-02531-9

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Competing Interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

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