ArticleNature communications2014
Metabolic enzyme expression highlights a key role for MTHFD2 and the mitochondrial folate pathway in cancer.
Article in Nature communications, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 380 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
380 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 587 citations in OpenAlex.
- Biomarker discovery in NAFLD: insights from metabolomics and vote counting meta-analysis.Metabolomics : Official journal of the Metabolomic Society · 2025Pooled it
- Current hotspots and trends in cancer metabolic reprogramming: a scientometric analysis.Frontiers in immunology · 2024Pooled it
- A multimodal atlas of tumour metabolism reveals the architecture of gene-metabolite covariation.Nature metabolism · 2023Pooled it
- Metabolites and cancer metastasis.Oncogene · 2026Review
- ThermoTargetMiner as a proteome integral solubility alteration target database for prospective drugs against lung cancer.Communications chemistry · 2026Article
- The mitochondrial chaperone HSPD1 folds MTHFD2 independently of its co-chaperone HSPE1.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2026Article
- A five-gene TAM and MYCN signature predicts prognosis and identifies MTHFD2 as a therapeutic target in neuroblastoma.Discover oncology · 2026Article
- Dynamic control of nucleotide metabolism in physiology and disease.Nature cell biology · 2026Review
- Nucleotide Metabolism in Health and Disease.MedComm · 2026Review
- Mitochondrial ETF insufficiency drives neoplastic growth by selectively optimizing cancer bioenergetics.eLife · 2026Article
- Review
- MTHFD2: a promising metabolic checkpoint for diseases.Journal of translational medicine · 2026Review
- The oncogenic control of nucleotide synthesis.Oncogenesis · 2026Review
- Investigating the oncogenic potential of MTHFD2 in oral squamous cell carcinoma.Journal of cancer research and clinical oncology · 2026Article
- Mitochondrial uncoupling inhibits serine catabolismCancer biology & medicine · 2026Article
- SHMT2 inhibition triggers mitochondrial apoptosis to suppress lung adenocarcinoma progression.Journal of translational medicine · 2026Article
- Integration of Bulk and Single-Cell Transcriptomics Reveals Prognostic and Immunological Roles of MTHFD2 in Clear Cell Renal Cell Carcinoma.International journal of molecular sciences · 2026Article
- Hallmarks of nuclear metabolism: implications for genome integrity, nuclear signaling, and therapeutic targeting.npj metabolic health and disease · 2026Review
- Multi-omics analysis reveals that ginsenoside Rb1 improves prognostic outcomes in sepsis by modulating mitochondrial metabolism MTHFD2 targets.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Metabolic Reprogramming ofCancer communications (London, England) · 2026Article
320 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
9 authors at 7 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Metabolic remodeling is now widely regarded as a hallmark of cancer, but it is not clear whether individual metabolic strategies are frequently exploited by many tumours. Here we compare messenger RNA profiles of 1,454 metabolic enzymes across 1,981 tumours spanning 19 cancer types to identify enzymes that are consistently differentially expressed. Our meta-analysis recovers established targets of some of the most widely used chemotherapeutics, including dihydrofolate reductase, thymidylate synthase and ribonucleotide reductase, while also spotlighting new enzymes, such as the mitochondrial proline biosynthetic enzyme PYCR1. The highest scoring pathway is mitochondrial one-carbon metabolism and is centred on MTHFD2. MTHFD2 RNA and protein are markedly elevated in many cancers and correlated with poor survival in breast cancer. MTHFD2 is expressed in the developing embryo, but is absent in most healthy adult tissues, even those that are proliferating. Our study highlights the importance of mitochondrial compartmentalization of one-carbon metabolism in cancer and raises important therapeutic hypotheses.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.