THE NATURE OF LEUKEMIC BLOOD CELLS AS DETERMINED BY THEIR METABOLISM

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Abstract
The metabolism of the blood cells of 15 patients with lymphatic and 40 patients with myelogenous leukemia was detd. manometrically with the Warburg method. Myeloblasts as well as lymphoblasts[long dash]in contrast to the more mature forms of leukocytes[long dash]had a purely oxidative metabolism and did not form lactic acid under aerobic conditions. The aerobic glycolysis-respiration ratio in the blood of a patient with myeloblastic leukemia (180,000 white cells per c.mm., 95% myeloblasts) was zero to 235, against 45 to 5 in normal blood. The anaerobic glycolysis of the myeloblastic blood was 7.6 times, the respiration 47 times greater than that of normal blood. The R.Q. of myeloblasts, measured in air, was 0.75. Aerobic glycolysis which occurred (independent of the rate of respiration) in more mature leukocytes was found to be a symptom of their aging and dying off. Myeloblasts, like lymphoblasts, exhibit under physiological exptl. conditions the energy-supplying reactions characteristic of uninjured normal young cells. From the viewpoint of cellular physiology the interpretation of leukemia as a tumor disease must be definitely discarded. The weakened resistance of patients with myeloblastic or lymphoblastic leukemia to bacterial infection was explained by the total lack of aerobic lactic acid formation in the immature white cells.

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