MINI REVIEW article
Front. Cell Dev. Biol.
Sec. Cancer Cell Biology
This article is part of the Research TopicExploring the Tumor Microenvironment: From Immune Dynamics to Therapeutic OpportunitiesView all articles
Metabolic reprogramming in bone metastasis of human cancers
Provisionally accepted
- 1Department of Orthopedics, No.242 Hospital Affiliated to Shenyang Medical College, Shenyang, Liaoning Province 110034,China, Shenyang, China
- 2Department of Thoracic Surgery, Cancer Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China
- 3Department of Thoracic Surgery, The People's Hospital of Liaoning Province, 33 Wenyi Road, Shenhe District, Shenyang, 110016, China., Shenyang, China
- 4Department of Anesthesiology, The First Affiliated Hospital of China Medical University, Shenyang, Liaoning 110001, China, Shenyang, China
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Bone metastasis represents a complex complication of advanced human malignancies. Metabolic reprogramming plays a critical role in bone metastasis. Tumor cells hijack and alter local metabolic pathways to fuel their energetic and biosynthetic demands for proliferation and survival within the bone metastatic microenvironment. This includes adaptations in glycolysis, oxidative phosphorylation, lipid metabolism and amino acid metabolism. Furthermore, this bone metastatic microenvironment exhibits distinct metabolic features, such as hypoxia and acidity. To survive in this hostile microenvironment, tumor cells that metastasize to bone have to undergo metabolic reprogramming. Collectively, understanding the intricate link between metabolic reprogramming and bone metastasis is crucial for developing novel therapeutic strategies. Targeting the specific metabolic addiction and interrupting the nutrient-based crosstalk between tumor cells and the bone stroma offers a promising way to inhibit the vicious cycle and bone metastatic progression.
Keywords: metabolic reprogramming, bone metastasis, hypoxia, microenvironment, Glycolysis
Received: 23 Sep 2025; Accepted: 29 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Li, Wang, Yang and Kang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Haitao Yang
Yihan Kang
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