Fig. 1From: Avenues of research in dietary interventions to target tumor metabolism in osteosarcomasource of biosynthetic molecules, while producing antioxidants and high amounts of lactate. In parallel, these cells fuel the TCA cycle with amino acids and, to a lesser extent, fatty acids, allowing these cells to use OXPHOS as a means of obtaining the bulk of ATP, while uncoupled from glycolysis. AA: Amino acids; FA: Fatty acids; TCA: Tricarboxylic acid cycle; OXPHOS: Oxidative phosphorylation; ATP: Adenosine triphosphateEnergetic metabolism of normal cells versus cancer cells. A In normal cells, energy in the form of ATP is typically obtained from glucose through the coupling of its initial breakdown (yielding a small amount of ATP—2 ATPs per glucose molecule) with the oxidation of its products in the mitochondrial TCA cycle and OXPHOS (yielding the bulk of ATP—34 ATPs per glucose molecule). Alternatively, energy can also be obtained from fatty acids and amino acids, which are fueled into the TCA cycle and OXPHOS. B Cancer cells, on the other hand, uncouple the anabolic glycolytic pathway from the catabolic TCA cycle and OXPHOS. They increase glucose uptake, utilizing aerobic glycolysis as the main Back to article page