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Journal ArticleDOI

Anti- and pro-tumor functions of autophagy

TL;DR: Current knowledge is reviewed on the dual role of autophagy as an anti- and pro-tumor mechanism, which would represent a major therapeutic target for chemosensitization.
About: This article is published in Biochimica et Biophysica Acta.The article was published on 2009-09-01 and is currently open access. It has received 354 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: BAG3 & Autophagy.
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This review focuses on mammalian autophagy, and an overview of the understanding of its machinery and the signaling cascades that regulate it is given, and the possibility of autophagic upregulation as a therapeutic approach for various conditions is considered.
Abstract: (Macro)autophagy is a bulk degradation process that mediates the clearance of long-lived proteins and organelles. Autophagy is initiated by double-membraned structures, which engulf portions of cytoplasm. The resulting autophagosomes ultimately fuse with lysosomes, where their contents are degraded. Although the term autophagy was first used in 1963, the field has witnessed dramatic growth in the last 5 years, partly as a consequence of the discovery of key components of its cellular machinery. In this review we focus on mammalian autophagy, and we give an overview of the understanding of its machinery and the signaling cascades that regulate it. As recent studies have also shown that autophagy is critical in a range of normal human physiological processes, and defective autophagy is associated with diverse diseases, including neurodegeneration, lysosomal storage diseases, cancers, and Crohn's disease, we discuss the roles of autophagy in health and disease, while trying to critically evaluate if the coincidence between autophagy and these conditions is causal or an epiphenomenon. Finally, we consider the possibility of autophagy upregulation as a therapeutic approach for various conditions.

1,616 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Understanding PCD and the complex interplay between apoptosis, autophagy and programmed necrosis pathways and apoptosis‐related microRNA regulation, in cancer may ultimately allow scientists and clinicians to harness the three types of PCD for discovery of further novel drug targets, in the future cancer treatment.
Abstract: Programmed cell death (PCD), referring to apoptosis, autophagy and programmed necrosis, is proposed to be death of a cell in any pathological format, when mediated by an intracellular program. These three forms of PCD may jointly decide the fate of cells of malignant neoplasms; apoptosis and programmed necrosis invariably contribute to cell death, whereas autophagy can play either pro-survival or pro-death roles. Recent bulk of accumulating evidence has contributed to a wealth of knowledge facilitating better understanding of cancer initiation and progression with the three distinctive types of cell death. To be able to decipher PCD signalling pathways may aid development of new targeted anti-cancer therapeutic strategies. Thus in this review, we present a brief outline of apoptosis, autophagy and programmed necrosis pathways and apoptosis-related microRNA regulation, in cancer. Taken together, understanding PCD and the complex interplay between apoptosis, autophagy and programmed necrosis may ultimately allow scientists and clinicians to harness the three types of PCD for discovery of further novel drug targets, in the future cancer treatment.

1,197 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
16 Dec 2011-Science
TL;DR: It is demonstrated that autophagy, which is often disabled in cancer, is dispensable for chemotherapy-induced cell death but required for its immunogenicity, and increased extracellular ATP concentrations improve the efficacy of antineoplastic chemotherapies when Autophagy is disabled.
Abstract: Antineoplastic chemotherapies are particularly efficient when they elicit immunogenic cell death, thus provoking an anticancer immune response. Here we demonstrate that autophagy, which is often disabled in cancer, is dispensable for chemotherapy-induced cell death but required for its immunogenicity. In response to chemotherapy, autophagy-competent, but not autophagy-deficient, cancers attracted dendritic cells and T lymphocytes into the tumor bed. Suppression of autophagy inhibited the release of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) from dying tumor cells. Conversely, inhibition of extracellular ATP-degrading enzymes increased pericellular ATP in autophagy-deficient tumors, reestablished the recruitment of immune cells, and restored chemotherapeutic responses but only in immunocompetent hosts. Thus, autophagy is essential for the immunogenic release of ATP from dying cells, and increased extracellular ATP concentrations improve the efficacy of antineoplastic chemotherapies when autophagy is disabled.

1,139 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The generation and sources of ROS within tumour cells, the regulation of ROS by antioxidant defence systems, as well as the effect of elevated ROS production on their signalling targets in cancer are discussed.

1,100 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: It is shown how network techniques can help in the identification of single-target, edgetic, multi-target and allo-network drug target candidates and an optimized protocol of network-aided drug development is suggested, and a list of systems-level hallmarks of drug quality is provided.

806 citations

References
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Journal ArticleDOI
07 Jan 2000-Cell
TL;DR: This work has been supported by the Department of the Army and the National Institutes of Health, and the author acknowledges the support and encouragement of the National Cancer Institute.

28,811 citations


"Anti- and pro-tumor functions of au..." refers background in this paper

  • ...Thus, disabled autophagy might constitute a common feature of cancer that adds to the hallmarks originally formulated in 2000 by Hanahan and Weinberg [108] and more recently integrated by other authors [109,110], namely provision of autonomous growth stimuli, insensitivity to antiproliferative signals, disabled apoptosis, limitless replication, production of angiogenic factors, tissue invasion with metastasis [108], avoidance of the immune response [110], and enhanced anabolic metabolism [109]....

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  • ...[108] D. Hanahan, R.A. Weinberg, The hallmarks of cancer, Cell 100 (2000) 57–70....

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  • ...In 2000, Hanahan andWeinberg [108] enum growth signals, insensitivity to antiproliferative signals, unlimited replicative potential, pro Subsequently, escape from immune surveillance and enhanced anabolism have been prop suppressor mechanism by (at least) three distinct means, namely by preserving genome s inflammation....

    [...]

Journal ArticleDOI
16 Nov 2000-Nature
TL;DR: The p53 tumour-suppressor gene integrates numerous signals that control cell life and death, and the disruption of p53 has severe consequences when a highly connected node in the Internet breaks down.
Abstract: The p53 tumour-suppressor gene integrates numerous signals that control cell life and death. As when a highly connected node in the Internet breaks down, the disruption of p53 has severe consequences.

6,605 citations


"Anti- and pro-tumor functions of au..." refers background in this paper

  • ..., ATM, Chk1), following the amplification-dependent overexpression of MDM2, the E3 ubiquitin ligase that directs p53 to proteasomemediated degradation, or as a result of the loss of p14 function [72,73]....

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  • ...p53 was initially described as a transcription factor that transactivates pro-apoptotic and cell cycle arresting programs [72], therefore inducing apoptosis and/or senescence of cancer cells characterized by irreparable genomic alterations, either in the context of tumor progression or following chemo- and/or radiotherapy [73]....

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Journal ArticleDOI
11 Jan 2008-Cell
TL;DR: This Review summarizes recent advances in understanding the physiological functions of autophagy and its possible roles in the causation and prevention of human diseases.

6,301 citations


"Anti- and pro-tumor functions of au..." refers background in this paper

  • ...Autophagic vacuolization has been observed in numerous pathophysiological scenarios [5,6], and the term “autophagic cell death” has been extensively employed to indicate a cell death subroutine lacking themorphological features of classical apoptosis and rathermanifesting with the cytoplasmic accumulation of autophagosomes [7]....

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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This review summarizes the current knowledge about the molecular machinery of autophagy and the role of the autophagic machinery in eukaryotic development and identifies a set of evolutionarily conserved genes that are essential forAutophagy.

3,721 citations


"Anti- and pro-tumor functions of au..." refers background in this paper

  • ...Autophagic vacuolization has been observed in numerous pathophysiological scenarios [5,6], and the term “autophagic cell death” has been extensively employed to indicate a cell death subroutine lacking themorphological features of classical apoptosis and rathermanifesting with the cytoplasmic accumulation of autophagosomes [7]....

    [...]

Journal ArticleDOI
23 Sep 2005-Cell
TL;DR: Bcl-2 not only functions as an antiapoptotic protein, but also as an antiautophagy protein via its inhibitory interaction with Beclin 1, which may help maintain autophagy at levels that are compatible with cell survival, rather than cell death.

3,384 citations


"Anti- and pro-tumor functions of au..." refers background in this paper

  • ...In particular, anti-apoptotic factors like Bcl-2 [41], Bcl-XL [42], Bcl-w [43] and Mcl-1 [42] suppress autophagy, mainly by interacting with and therefore inhibiting Bec-1....

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