October 2025

Glyphosate in Metabolic Diseases and Cancer

Joseph Corsini, Ph.D. and Julie Alessandra, MTE

Glycine is one of the 20 amino acids used by life, present in nearly every protein on the planet. Add a phosphorylated methyl group to glycine and you have glyphosate, the active ingredient the in the herbicide Roundup. Round-up, a wistful name invoking images of clean air, green fields, lowing cattle, and rugged horse riders tending their bovine charges. The reality is quite different, with corporate ranch technicians on four-wheelers spraying ditch banks while, overhead, crop-dusters douse the surrounding corn stands and houses with toxic herbicides and insecticides. These corn fields are then mowed down with huge machines and minced into silage, which is mixed with protein meal in giant rubber vats and covered with plastic that leeches phthalates and dioxin (both are known endocrine disrupters) into the silage.  The silage is then shipped to feedlots containing thousands of beasts wading around in a slurry of mud and bodily waste. 

One of the most widely used chemicals in the world, glyphosate and its metabolites have contaminated all of the terrestrial ecosystems on the planet, especially those that provide humans with food, water, and oxygen (Bai and Ogbourne 2016, Maggie et al 2020, Gomarasca et al 2024). In the soil, glyphosate is converted to amino-methyl-phosphonic acid (AMPA), whose effects on living systems are largely unknown. Monsanto first produced Roundup in the 1970’s, and in 2018 the Canadian firm Bayer purchased Monsanto. Recently, Bayer was ordered to pay $611 million dollars in a tort case contending that Roundup caused cancer in the 49 year old plaintiff. This case and others went to the plaintiffs because evidence for the toxic effects of chronic exposure to glyphosate and the carrier chemicals in Roundup is accumulating (Samsel and Senef 2017; Peilles and Pelletier 2020, Costas-Ferreira 2022). The physiological effects of glyphosate have been studied in many labs, showing that it disrupts a variety of cellular systems, including the mitochondria (Strilbyska et al 2022) and collagen (Samsel and Seneff 2017). Collagen and elastin are critical proteins that provide our tissues with strength and flexibility - misincorporation of glyphosate in place of glycine into both of these proteins is expected to change the hydration state of the collagen-elastin network, contributing to disrupted hydration networks and loss of connective tissue function. Furthermore, there is some evidence suggesting that the extensive network of fascia has other as yet poorly understood roles besides the purely structural one including: body-wide communication, interfacing with the nervous system, liquid crystal behavior, and piezoelectric influences (Mitov 2017; Schleip et al 2022; Hossain and Blanchard 2023).  Glyphosate would be expected to interfere with these processes too.  

Effects of glyphosate on the circadian system have been observed in rats, showing that chronic exposure reduces melatonin levels and increases oxidative stress (Cattani et al 2023). Interestingly, glyphosate has also been shown to disrupt sleep in honeybees (Vasquez et al 2020), suggesting that it has widespread effects on the natural metabolic cycles of all insects and probably all multi-celled organisms. Glyphosate also has antimicrobial activities that kill beneficial bacteria of the intestinal flora (microbes in our intestinal tract) of animals, including humans (Barnett et al 2022; Walsh 2023). A number of studies suggest that glyphosate actually selects for pathogenic or metabolic disease associated species of bacteria and kills the beneficial strains (for examples see Bote et al 2019, Lehman et al 2023). Indeed, we expect that many of our microbial partners will be sensitive to glyphosate because they utilize the same exact enzyme (5-enolpyruvyl-shikimate-3-phosphate (EPSP) synthase) that glyphosate targets in plants. This enzyme is required in many bacteria, archaebacteria, plants, fungi, and algae for the synthesis the amino acids tyrosine, phenylalanine, and tryptophan (animals don’t have this enzyme so need to absorb these amino acids from their diet or from the activity of microbes in their gut). In fact, the gene for Roundup resistance that has been genetically engineered into our domestic corn, soybeans, and cotton was isolated from a pathogenic Salmonella species.

The link between glyphosate and cancer has been extensively investigated, often with conflicting results and conclusions by various labs (for examples see Schluter et al 2024; Berry 2020; Andreotti et al 2018; Samsel and Senef 2015). Glyphosate has a variety of metabolic effects with potential to promote transformation of normal cells in to cancer cells. Lucia colleagues (2022) have found that elevated AMPA levels correlate with aberrant methylation patterns in cancer related genes of post-menopausal women. Glyphosate at moderate levels has been shown to be directly genotoxic (mutagenic) in cultured HepG2 (human liver origin – Gasnier et al 2009), MDA-MB-231 (triple negative human breast - Almeida et al 2018), and HEC1A (human uterine epithelium-Almeida et al 2018). Glyphosate has also been observed to alter gene expression in cultured rat cells, leading to metabolic disturbances with the potential to promote transformation. The influence of glyphosate on the vast array of metabolic pathways is difficult to trace in the laboratory, so Dong and Zhu (2025) have developed pathway-intersection simulations and applied them to improving our understanding of renal damage and kidney cancers induced by glyphosate (Dong and Zhu 2025). So, it appears that, while the glyphosate-cancer picture in humans is not yet crystal clear, the evidence suggests that low to moderate levels of glyphosate have direct genotoxic activity and disrupt the metabolic balance in cells in ways that can promote carcinogenesis (cancer formation).

From photosynthetic cyanobacteria in ponds and rivers to symbiotic fungi in the soils of our forests, glyphosate is assuredly affecting the biosphere in ways that we do not yet understand. Its half-life in the environment and especially in food was initially reported to be short, but studies since then have shown that it can persist much longer than originally thought. We humans are all regularly exposed to glyphosate to varying degrees through our diet, tap water, and landscaping chemicals, but epidemiological studies demonstrating the extent of exposure in humans are lacking (reviewed in Gillezeau et al 2019). We can only guess about the reasons for this lack of data, but it certainly has to do with the fact that that funding of such projects is politically unpopular, in large part because industry rhetoric has historically downplayed the risks of ubiquitous Roundup application. Combine that with strategic lobby activity, and we arrive at the current situation with widespread chronic exposure to low to moderate levels of glyphosate. Despite the fact that regulatory agencies range from ambivalent to supportive of glyphosate and say nothing about its breakdown product AMPA, we recommend avoiding it altogether when possible.

Although glyphosate is difficult to avoid entirely, there are several recommendations to get started.  Corn has been genetically engineered to resist glyphosate, so supermarket corn and corn products are very likely to contain higher levels of glyphosate. Roundup is also used to artificially ripen wheat, so bread and other wheat products are also likely to have higher levels of glyphosate. Filter tap water to remove glyphosate, purchase organic or locally grown foods from trusted farms, grow your own food, avoid areas, such as park borders and ditch banks, that you know have been sprayed with Roundup. And of course, do not ever use Roundup on your own property!

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