The Problem of Cellular Anarchy

Abstract

The researches of Regaud and his pupils on the question of the correlation between cellular activity and cellular radio-sensitivity, furnish material of great value in understanding the character of cellular anarchy. These experiments at the same time open up quite a number of cardinal questions bearing on the problem of malignant tumors. Of what do the biological and physical entities of cellular radiosensitivity consist? What cytological paths are followed in the reconstitution of cellular unity? What is the role of cell membranes in particular and cell lipoids in general? The object of my own researches has largely been the attempt to solve these questions and to cast a little light upon the vast and vague subject of cellular anarchy. In my investigations devoted to various cytoplasmic structures (Sokoloff, 1920–1922) I showed experimentally the correlation between the characteristic form of the mitochondria and the degree of activity of the malignant cell. The correlation is clearer in my experiences with cancerous tissue submitted to the action of radium rays. The appearance of the mitochondral network is violently altered after the application of radium rays from 48 to 64 hours. The mitochondria, which in the majority of malignant cells are but little organized and appear but little related to the plasma after the application of radium, are gradually altered into fine and almost invisible minute granules (B. Sokoloff, J. Cancer Res., 1925, ix, 464). The cellular incorporations also becomes modified as the tumor shrinks and the mitotic index changes. Their importance is shown very strongly in the process of cancerization. These findings completed my former researches devoted to the nuclocytoplasmic relations of the malignant cell (B. Sokoloff, 1922). I demonstrated the similarity between this relation and the characteristics of the mitochondria. At the same time the role of cellular lipoids is clearly apparent in life processes of the cell.