Cancer progression, the compounding of mutations and the bi-directional signalling between the tumor and the surrounding cellular milieu creates a complex and heterogeneous tissue that forms the disease and its tumour microenvironment (TME), all of which influence the patients anti-tumor immune response.
Metabolic changes can impact a tumour's ability to subvert the immune response to either evade or more destructively induce immune cells to undergo cell death. Furthermore, metabolic reprogramming allows for diseases to become resistant to treatments such as immunotherapy, driving subsequent recurrences. The resulting changes tend to take place with little regulation, causing a wide range of cytokines and other small molecules to be released in the TME and drive inflammation and extracellular degradation making it problematic for the immune response to effectively suppress tumour progression, thus leading to further disease progression.
There are many metabolic pathways that are reprogrammed in malignant tissue, from the Warburg Effect for energy production, to the inhibition of tumour suppressor genes such as p53, amplification of MYC as well as dysregulation of the PI3 kinase pathway (among many others). As cancer cells undergo these extensive alterations in their metabolome to meet energy demands, they also influence the TME to suit the requirements for sustained proliferation. The harsh environment of the TME can also cause unwanted metabolic changes in the immune cells themselves, enabling subsequent tumour progression, invasion and metastasis. These processes profoundly impact the ability of multiple therapeutic interventions to effectively combat cancer. We would like to highlight the interactions and crucial relationship between metabolic reprogramming and the immune system.
This Research Topic will welcome Original Research and Review articles focusing on:
• The interactions between immune cells and cancer metabolic reprogramming
• Current or future immunotherapies targeting metabolic pathways
• Immune cancers and their metabolic changes
• Metabolic reprogramming and immune evasion in a malignant progression such as invasion, metastasis, epigenetic, transcriptional and post-translational regulation
Important Note: Manuscripts consisting solely of bioinformatics, computational analysis, or predictions of public databases which are not accompanied by validation (independent cohort or biological validation in vitro or in vivo) will not be accepted in any of the sections of Frontiers in Oncology.
Cancer progression, the compounding of mutations and the bi-directional signalling between the tumor and the surrounding cellular milieu creates a complex and heterogeneous tissue that forms the disease and its tumour microenvironment (TME), all of which influence the patients anti-tumor immune response.
Metabolic changes can impact a tumour's ability to subvert the immune response to either evade or more destructively induce immune cells to undergo cell death. Furthermore, metabolic reprogramming allows for diseases to become resistant to treatments such as immunotherapy, driving subsequent recurrences. The resulting changes tend to take place with little regulation, causing a wide range of cytokines and other small molecules to be released in the TME and drive inflammation and extracellular degradation making it problematic for the immune response to effectively suppress tumour progression, thus leading to further disease progression.
There are many metabolic pathways that are reprogrammed in malignant tissue, from the Warburg Effect for energy production, to the inhibition of tumour suppressor genes such as p53, amplification of MYC as well as dysregulation of the PI3 kinase pathway (among many others). As cancer cells undergo these extensive alterations in their metabolome to meet energy demands, they also influence the TME to suit the requirements for sustained proliferation. The harsh environment of the TME can also cause unwanted metabolic changes in the immune cells themselves, enabling subsequent tumour progression, invasion and metastasis. These processes profoundly impact the ability of multiple therapeutic interventions to effectively combat cancer. We would like to highlight the interactions and crucial relationship between metabolic reprogramming and the immune system.
This Research Topic will welcome Original Research and Review articles focusing on:
• The interactions between immune cells and cancer metabolic reprogramming
• Current or future immunotherapies targeting metabolic pathways
• Immune cancers and their metabolic changes
• Metabolic reprogramming and immune evasion in a malignant progression such as invasion, metastasis, epigenetic, transcriptional and post-translational regulation
Important Note: Manuscripts consisting solely of bioinformatics, computational analysis, or predictions of public databases which are not accompanied by validation (independent cohort or biological validation in vitro or in vivo) will not be accepted in any of the sections of Frontiers in Oncology.
