Dichloroacetate (DCA) and Cancer: Advancing DCA to a Cancer Therapeutic
A special issue of International Journal of Molecular Sciences (ISSN 1422-0067). This special issue belongs to the section "Molecular Oncology".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 December 2021) | Viewed by 10238
Special Issue Editor
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
The recognition of altered metabolism as a hallmark of cancer has led to much interest in the potential of targeting the metabolic phenotype of cancer cells as a therapeutic approach. An important component of the phenotype is the glycolytic phenotype, or Warburg effect, which can contribute to many other phenotypes of cancer, such as drug resistance and stemness. At this stage, however, agents specifically targeting the glycolytic phenotype are still limited to clinical trials.
Dichloroacetate, which is an inhibitor of pyruvate dehydrogenase kinases, is a good candidate for cancer therapy. With decades of clinical use in congenital lactic acidosis, its use in a small number of early phase clinical trials for cancer therapy has been published. The next steps for clinical trials involve identifying those cancer types most appropriate for DCA treatment, deciding which combination therapies to test, and developing a better understanding of the effects of altering metabolism on cancer cell phenotypes, such as metastatic behavior and drug resistance. This requires a deeper molecular understanding of the actions of DCA, and identification of biomarkers that may predict which cancers will respond.
In this Special Issue of IJMS, we are seeking papers (original, reviews, communications, and new concepts) that can contribute to the molecular and pre-clinical knowledge base around the actions of DCA on cancer cells and cancer microenvironments, to inform the future clinical trials of DCA. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to the following:
- Metabolic and gene expression signatures and readouts of anti-cancer activities of DCA
- Additional mechanisms and pathways of action of DCA with implications for cancer therapy
- Investigations in pre-clinical models of cancer
- Activity and molecular mechanisms of DCA in combination with other therapies
- Novel formulations of DCA
- Investigations of the role and regulation of pyruvate and lactate metabolism in cancer
- Investigations of other pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase inhibitors
Dr. Anneke Blackburn
Guest Editor
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Keywords
- Pyruvate dehydrogenase
- Pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase inhibitor
- PDK2
- Dichloroacetate
- Cancer glycolytic phenotype
- Warburg effect
- Mitochondrial activation
- Biomarker
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