Role of Autophagy in Cancer Stem Cells and the Tumor Microenvironment: New Frontiers in Cancer Drug Discovery
A special issue of Cancers (ISSN 2072-6694). This special issue belongs to the section "Tumor Microenvironment".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 November 2024 | Viewed by 304
Special Issue Editors
Interests: drug discovery; targeting autophagy; pharmacogenomics; drug resistance
Interests: signal transduction; Akt; protein kinase C; mechanistic target of rapamycin/S6 kinase; apoptosis; autophagy; senescence; breast cancer
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: hypoxia; autophagy; extracellular vesicles; unfolded protein response
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Autophagy, a conserved cellular degradation process, plays an essential role in the breakdown, elimination, and recycling of dysfunctional as well as damaged organelles. The dysregulation of autophagy has been implicated in the pathogenesis of various human diseases, including cancer. A growing body of research demonstrated a paradoxical role for autophagy in cancer development and progression that is influenced by tumor stage, genetics, and the tumor microenvironment.
To date, attempts to target autophagy for cancer therapy have yielded mixed results and uncovered several challenges. For instance, tumor cells can adapt and develop resistance to autophagy inhibition. Targeting autophagy only revealed efficacy in autophagy-addicted cancers. Additionally, the suppression of autophagy was associated with promoting metastasis and tumor recurrence. As such, the evaluation of (hydroxy)chloroquine in clinical trials revealed several key limitations.
A growing body of research suggests that autophagy could modulate various novel mechanisms, including tumor immunity and cancer stem cells. This Special Issue aims to publish original research articles or comprehensive reviews focusing on the role of autophagy in therapeutic resistance, cancer stem cell survival, autophagy addiction, and the tumor microenvironment. It will also focus on studies that shed light on new approaches for targeting autophagy and defining novel pharmacological targets to modulate autophagy in cancer.
Dr. Yasser Heakal
Prof. Dr. Alakananda Basu
Prof. Dr. Kasper M. Rouschop
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Cancers is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- autophagy
- cancer stem cells
- tumor microenvironment
- therapeutic resistance
- metastasis
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