Word: uracil
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...metabolites"-foods that have been altered chemically in the body. In some types of leukemia it had been shown that malignant cells can be fooled into accepting a phony metabolite, or "antimetabolite." When it was shown in 1954 that solid cancers have an abnormal appetite for the metabolite called uracil, the University of Wisconsin's Dr. Charles Heidelberger set about making a phony variant of uracil. With Dr. Robert Duschinsky of Hoffmann-La Roche, Inc., he quickly found a way to make one by substituting an atom of fluorine for one of hydrogen at the No. 5 position...
...practical use of 5-fluorouracil is by no means so simple as the theory. There are other body cells that multiply about as fast as cancer cells, and therefore need a lot of uracil, notably those in the bone marrow, which makes blood cells, and those in the lining of the digestive tract. Soon after 5-fluorouracil has attacked the cancer, it damages these vital, normal cells. Patients begin to suffer from vomiting. At the first sign of inflammation and ulceration in the mouth, doctors stop the drug. Usually they try to give heavy doses (injected into an arm vein...
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