Yet another approach is not to starve a tumor of energy but to give it more energy, and that is the idea behind a substance called dichloroacetate, or DCA. Dr. Evangelos Michelakis of the University of Alberta, who came up with the idea, says there is a mechanism by which cells that become defective can commit suicide for the greater good of the body.
But cancer cells usually do not kill themselves. Dr. Michelakis says this could be because they lack sufficient energy.
DCA, a simple chemical that is formed in small quantities when drinking water is chlorinated, has long been used to treat certain rare diseases in which lactic acid builds up in the body. DCA inhibits an enzyme called pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase. The effect of that inhibition is to move metabolism away from lactic acid-producing glycolysis and toward more normal oxidation of glucose in the mitochondria, the energy factories of the cell.
