作者
Maksim Sinyuk, Erin E Mulkearns-Hubert, Ofer Reizes, Justin Lathia
发表日期
2018/12/21
来源
Frontiers in oncology
卷号
8
页码范围
646
出版商
Frontiers Media SA
简介
Despite concerted clinical and research efforts, cancer is a leading cause of death worldwide. Surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy have remained the most common standard-of-care strategies against cancer for decades. However, the side effects of these therapies demonstrate the need to investigate adjuvant novel treatment modalities that minimize the harm caused to healthy cells and tissues. Normal and cancerous cells require communication amongst themselves and with their surroundings to proliferate and drive tumor growth. It is vital to understand how intercellular and external communication impacts tumor cell malignancy. To survive and grow, tumor cells, and their normal counterparts utilize cell junction molecules including gap junctions (GJs), tight junctions, and adherens junctions to provide contact points between neighboring cells and the extracellular matrix. GJs are specialized structures composed of a family of connexin proteins that allow the free diffusion of small molecules and ions directly from the cytoplasm of adjacent cells, without encountering the extracellular milieu, which enables rapid, and coordinated cellular responses to internal and external stimuli. Importantly, connexins perform three main cellular functions. They enable direct gap junction intercellular communication (GJIC) between cells, form hemichannels to allow cell communication with the extracellular environment, and serve as a site for protein-protein interactions to regulate signaling pathways. Connexins themselves have been found to promote tumor cell growth and invasiveness, contributing to the overall tumorigenicity and have emerged as attractive …
引用总数
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学术搜索中的文章
M Sinyuk, EE Mulkearns-Hubert, O Reizes, J Lathia - Frontiers in oncology, 2018