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In this Review, Erez and colleagues examine the complex interactions among tumours, their microenvironment and the host, shaping a metabolic macroenvironment that drives cancer progression. They explore how this crosstalk impacts on metastasis, inflammation and cachexia, providing insights for enhanced cancer management.
In a recent study published in Nature, Zhuang et al. outline how ageing affects stemness and tumorigenic potential of tumour-initiating alveolar stem cells in the lung.
Genomic mutations can be translated into modified functional proteins, impacting protein–protein interactions (PPIs) and thus altering cellular functions. In this Review, Fu, Mo and Ivanov summarize the mechanisms by which oncogenic mutations impact PPIs, technologies for monitoring this, the categories and features of PPIs in cancer, and finally the therapeutic implications of this.
The mechanisms by which dietary fructose promotes tumour progression have remained poorly understood. A recent study published in Nature reveals that dietary fructose is metabolized in the liver, resulting in elevated circulating lipid levels that can serve as building blocks for cancer cells outside the liver.
Conventional chemotherapy has successfully cured millions of patients with cancer, yet the mechanisms of action for this remain unclear. In this Perspective, Letai and de The assess the existing mechanisms proposed for the success of chemotherapy, identify gaps in our understanding and suggest principles for improving the utility of conventional chemotherapy to enhance treatment efficacy.
Patient-derived xenograft (PDX) models are valuable surrogates for drug testing in precision oncology. In this Review, Welm and colleagues outline the opportunities and challenges of PDX models, discuss their relevance in functional precision oncology for replicating patient biology and share their perspective on how integrating these models with artificial intelligence can enhance their utility for personalizing cancer treatment.
Intercellular mitochondrial transfer via tunnelling nanotubes can influence cellular bioenergetics and function in tumours. A study in Cell demonstrates how this process can increase CD8+ T cell metabolic fitness and anti-tumour function.
Wang et al. demonstrate that lactate derived from glioblastoma stem cells, microglia and macrophages drives histone lactylation, activating immunosuppressive transcriptional programs and upregulating CD47, to suppress phagocytosis.
Genetic predisposition is the major known cause of cancer in children and adolescents. In this Review, Kratz highlights the genetic architecture of cancer in children and adolescents, examining cancer predisposition syndromes, cancer predisposition genes, embryonic mosaicism and polygenic risk scores, focusing on their roles in cancer prediction, prevention, surveillance and therapy.
In this Journal Club, Chakrabarti discusses a method to dissect the molecular architecture of inheritable gene expression (memory) states that mark cells that transition into drug-tolerant persister cells in melanoma.
Androgen receptor (AR) signalling plays an important role in several cancers beyond prostate cancer. This Review highlights the context-dependent functions of AR in non-prostatic malignancies, examining the intrinsic function of AR in cancer cells and the tumour microenvironment, and summarizes ongoing AR-targeted clinical trials.
Chromothripsis is an extreme form of chromosome instability that causes the acquisition of multiple genomic aberrations. Simovic-Lorenz and Ernst discuss mechanistic models of chromothripsis and outline its role in cancer development and tumour evolution. Vulnerabilities of chromothriptic tumours that could be therapeutically exploited are also discussed.
In this Comment, Ben-Aharon et al. advocate for the creation of designated OncoYoung programs to address the unique needs of individuals with early-onset cancer, as well as multinational platforms with dedicated funding to investigate the aetiology of this disease and to develop preventive measures.
In this Review, Wang and Zhang summarize the major findings of genetic and epigenetic association studies performed on cohorts of survivors of childhood cancer, which provide insights into the long-term adverse effects related to cancer therapy, and present suggestions for a future survivorship research strategy to inform precision survivorship care.
The occurrence of multiple independent tumours in patients with EGFR-mutant lung cancer was unexplained. A recent study in Nature Cancer identified distinct genetic predisposition mechanisms, including developmental mosaicism and germline EGFR variants, that contribute to the formation of multiple primary tumours.
Engel et al. conducted a genetic screen in which they identified the Fanconi anaemia (FA) pathway as a driver of chromothripsis, complex genomic rearrangements and generation of extrachromosomal DNA.
In this Journal Club, Chae and Chung discuss a study characterizing the differentiation and maturation of both tumour-resident and circulating B cells in patients with melanoma.
Ageing is a well-accepted risk factor for developing cancer. Yan et al. used a preclinical rat model to study the mechanisms facilitating the age-associated increase in breast tumorigenesis.
The Cancer Dependency Map (DepMap) is a data repository and research platform that can be utilized to systematically identify cancer vulnerabilities. Here Arafeh, Shibue et al. outline the current limitations and future strategies to enhance the DepMap project.
