Browse Articles

Targeting platelets represents a promising approach to improve the therapeutic efficacy of chemotherapy and cancer immunotherapy. Here, Li and colleagues highlight the dynamic role of platelets in tumour development, progression, and response to therapy, and underscore the utility of tumour-educated platelets for precise tumour diagnosis and treatment.

In this Tools of the Trade article, Xiwen Tang describes the development of in vivo reporters detecting mutant p53 at the protein level, which enables the visualization of precancerous cells during cancer initiation.

Enzymes that produce metabolites specifically required by cancer cells have become attractive targets for therapy. Recently, Doshi et al. highlighted the potential of targeting the detoxifying enzyme UXS1 in cancer.

This Review by Elena B. Pasquale outlines the current understanding of Eph receptor–ephrin signalling mechanisms in cancer progression and therapy resistance, and also details therapeutic strategies for targeting the Eph system as a novel cancer therapy and for improving the efficacy of conventional cancer therapies.

Although childhood cancer survival rates have increased globally, there is a markedly inequitable distribution of these advances. Here, Monica Gramatges summarizes these challenges and provides the reader with strategies and solutions that begin to address factors that contribute to these inequities.

In this Journal Club, Hajj discusses a study demonstrating that oncogene activation modulates immune control through both transcription and translation.

Maas et al. identify an inflammatory, immunosuppressive phenotype in neutrophils that accumulates in brain malignancies, and show that this tumour-promoting neutrophil activation is driven by the brain tumour microenvironment.

Wang et al. show that antibiotic targeting of anaerobic intratumoral bacteria exposes a unique repertoire of microbial neoantigens that can successfully trigger cellular immunity against colorectal cancer in mice.

Deubiquitinating enzymes (DUBs) function in opposition to E3 ubiquitin ligases by removing ubiquitin from substrates to control protein and organelle homeostasis and responses to cellular stimuli. In this Review, Dewson et al. describe the many associations of DUBs with the hallmarks of cancer, with a view to identifying those DUBs most likely to impact cancer-associated phenotypes if targeted with selective inhibition.

Although tumour metabolism is well recognized as a key feature in cancer initiation and progression, little is known about metabolic reprogramming in patients. In this Review, Bartman et al. discuss stable-isotope tracing as a means to probe tumour metabolism in vivo and provide an overview of isotope labelling studies performed in patients with cancer.

In this Review, Swietach and colleagues discuss how the pH balance is dysregulated in tumours and how alterations in intracellular and extracellular pH affect tumour biology to accelerate disease progression, providing a rationale for therapeutic targeting of acid–base disturbances in cancer.

In this Tools of the Trade article, Hongcheng Mai describes the development of wildDISCO, an approach for whole-body immunolabelling, optical clearing and imaging in mice.

 People from minority racial and ethnic groups continue to experience disproportionate cancer incidences and cancer-associated mortality rates. In this Comment, Byrd and Wolf explore the contribution of non-medical factors to the composition of the gut microbiome, and how this may be an actionable target for reducing these disparities.

Adrenocortical carcinoma is a rare endocrine cancer with a dismal survival rate and limited therapeutic options. This Review outlines the recent advances that have been made in the understanding of the molecular basis of adrenocortical carcinoma and what this means for the diagnosis and treatment of patients with this cancer type.

Pregnancy-associated breast cancers are typically diagnosed at more advanced stages than other breast cancers. Recently, Saura et al. developed a non-invasive screening method using breast milk to diagnose patients prior to tumour detection by imaging.

T cells can acquire a broad spectrum of differentiation states following activation; certain subtypes of T cells have emerged as key determinants of cancer immunity and response to immunotherapies. Here, Gebhardt, Park and Parish discuss the phenotypic and functional variation of stem-like exhausted CD8⁺ T cells and memory CD8⁺ T cells, and how it contributes to their roles in immune escape and cancer outcome.

Transfer RNAs have long been known as static adaptors that translate the genetic code but are now emerging as dynamic regulators in health and disease, including cancer. This Review discusses how the deregulation of the tRNA pool, tRNA-derived small RNAs and tRNA synthetases impacts tumour initiation and progression.

In this Tool of the Trade article, Nicolas Mathey-Andrews describes the generation and use of a prime editor mouse that enables in vivo modelling of the multitude of cancer alleles found in human tumours.

In a recent study, Sanchez-Aguilera, Masmudi-Martín et al. find that a molecular program explains the cognitive impairment often seen in patients with brain metastasis, challenging the prevailing paradigm of the tumour mass being the sole cause of altered brain function.

In this Journal Club, Kinker & Medina discuss a study showing the role of tumour-associated tertiary lymphoid structures in improving immunotherapy response and overall survival in patients with melanoma.