Every cell in the body needs sugar to survive. But cancer cells seem to require more than healthy cells do.
They also seem to break sugar down faster. Cancer’s mechanism of quickly and efficiently metabolizing sugar is known as the Warburg effect.
In fact, we’ve know about the Warburg since the 1920’s when Otto Warburg and colleagues observed tumors taking up enormous amounts of glucose compared to what was seen in the surrounding tissue. Additionally, glucose was fermented to produce lactate even in the presence of oxygen, thus the term aerobic glycolysis.