bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.09.05.284521; this version posted September 7, 2020. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. Methionine synthase supports tumor tetrahydrofolate pools Joshua Z. Wang1,2,#, Jonathan M. Ghergurovich1,3,#, Lifeng Yang1,2, and Joshua D. Rabinowitz1,2,* 1 Lewis-Sigler Institute for Integrative Genomics, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey, USA 2 Department of Chemistry, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey, USA 3 Department of Molecular Biology, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey, USA # These authors contributed equally to this work. *Corresponding author: Joshua Rabinowitz Department of Chemistry and the Lewis-Sigler Institute for Integrative Genomics, Princeton University, Washington Rd, Princeton, NJ 08544, USA Phone: (609) 258-8985; e-mail:
[email protected] Conflict of Interest Disclosure: J.D.R. is a paid advisor and stockholder in Kadmon Pharmaceuticals, L.E.A.F. Pharmaceuticals, and Rafael Pharmaceuticals; a paid consultant of Pfizer; a founder, director, and stockholder of Farber Partners and Serien Therapeutics. JDR and JMG are inventors of patents in the area of folate metabolism held by Princeton University. 1 bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.09.05.284521; this version posted September 7, 2020. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. Abstract Mammalian cells require activated folates to generate nucleotides for growth and division. The most abundant circulating folate species is 5-methyl tetrahydrofolate (5-methyl- THF), which is used to synthesize methionine from homocysteine via the cobalamin-dependent enzyme methionine synthase (MTR).