Cancer therapies, in addition to inducing cell death, can trigger cellular senescence of tumour cells, and factors secreted from senescent cells might negatively affect the tumour microenvironment. A new study by Wang et al. shows that eradication of therapy-induced senescent cells (senolysis) can improve the outcome of liver cancer therapy.
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Acknowledgements
L.Z. was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (FOR2314, SFB-TR209, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Program) and the German Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF). Further funding was provided by the DFG under Germany’s excellence strategy EXC 2180-390900677 (Image Guided and Functionally Instructed Tumour Therapies (iFIT)), the Landesstiftung Baden-Wuerttemberg, the European Research Council (CholangioConcept) and the German Cancer Research Center (DKTK).
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K.W. and L.Z. are listed as inventors on a patent relating to PET tracers for the non-invasive detection of cellular senescence.
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Wolter, K., Zender, L. Therapy-induced senescence — an induced synthetic lethality in liver cancer?. Nat Rev Gastroenterol Hepatol (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41575-020-0262-3
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