The metabolic role of leucovorin. Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • Interest in determining if leucovorin, known chemically as 5-formyltetra-hydrofolate, plays a role in one-carbon metabolism is reemerging. While investigations in the 1940s suggested it was an important donor of one-carbon units in folate-mediated biosynthetic reactions, studies between the 1950s and 1980s disproved this hypothesis and dismissed its presence in biological systems as artifactual. Recently, new data has focused attention on the possible biological function of this compound that is widely used in cancer chemotherapy.

published proceedings

  • Trends Biochem Sci

author list (cited authors)

  • Stover, P., & Schirch, V.

citation count

  • 119

complete list of authors

  • Stover, P||Schirch, V

publication date

  • March 1993