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Translational cancer biology

Section edited by Cristina Maccalli

This section aims to provide a platform for the communication and dissemination of advances in cancer biology and their translational applications. Studies considered for publication include those dissecting the mechanisms of transformation, progression and metastatization, the biology of cancer stem cells and their immunological properties, the mechanisms undergoing the epithelial-to mesenchymal (EMT) transition and tumor dormancy, their relationship with immune functions and the mechanisms undergoing cancer resistance to therapies. 

This section is also dedicated to those investigations dedicated to the translational aspects and the development of novel therapies related to the aforementioned themes and the identification of patient’s responsiveness and outcome to therapies.

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  1. The prognosis of pancreatic cancer patients remains relatively poor. Although some patients would receive surgical resection, distant metastasis frequently occurs within one year. Epithelial-mesenchymal transi...

    Authors: Yuanyang Wang, Cheng Qin, Bangbo Zhao, Zeru Li, Tianyu Li, Xiaoying Yang, Yutong Zhao and Weibin Wang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:201
  2. The interaction between the tumor-microenvironment (TME) and the cancer cells has emerged as a key player in colorectal cancer (CRC) metastasis. A small proportion of CRC cells which undergo epithelial-mesench...

    Authors: Jinsen Zheng, Rongzhang Dou, Xinyao Zhang, Bo Zhong, Chenggang Fang, Qian Xu, Ziyang Di, Sihao Huang, Zaihuan Lin, Jialin Song, Shuyi Wang and Bin Xiong
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:153
  3. Cancer-testis antigens (CTAs) are often expressed in tumor and testicular tissues but not in other normal tissues. To date, there has been no comprehensive study of the expression and clinical significance of ...

    Authors: Yu Miao, Yosuke Konno, Baojin Wang, Lin Zhu, Tianyue Zhai, Kei Ihira, Noriko Kobayashi, Hidemichi Watari, Xin Jin, Junming Yue, Peixin Dong and Mingyan Fang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:151
  4. Histone deacetylases (HDAC) contribute to oncogenic program, pointing to their inhibitors as a potential strategy against cancers. We, thus, studied the mechanism of HDAC inhibitor ITF2357 in resistance of mut...

    Authors: Jian Cui, Fei Xu, Wei Bai, Tiantian Zhao, Junbo Hong and Wei Zuo
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:125
  5. Metastasis is the predominant cause of mortality in patients with breast cancer. Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) have been shown to drive important phenotypes in tumors, including invasion and metastasis. Howeve...

    Authors: Rong Guo, Yonghui Su, Qi Zhang, Bingqiu Xiu, Sheng Huang, Weiru Chi, Liyi Zhang, Lun Li, Jianjing Hou, Jia Wang, Jiajian Chen, Yayun Chi, Jingyan Xue and Jiong Wu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:120
  6. The role of microRNA (miRNA) in modulating the function of cancer stem cells through diverse signaling pathway has been evidenced. We here identified a role of microRNA (miRNA) family, specifically miR-148/152...

    Authors: Xiaoying Li, Lin Li and Jiangying Wu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:105
  7. Sirtuin 3 (Sirt3) is a controversial regulator of carcinogenesis. It residents in the mitochondria and gradually decays during aging. In this study, we tried to investigate the role of Sirt3 in carcinogenesis ...

    Authors: Liyi Wu, Xinyi Yan, Ruibo Sun, Ye Ma, Wanyu Yao, Baogui Gao, Qingyuan Zhang, Junxiong You, Hao Wang, Qinrui Han and Xuegang Sun
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:81
  8. Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) is a major worldwide health problem due to its high prevalence and mortality rate. A disintegrin and metalloproteinase 12 (ADAM12) is aberrantly expressed in various can...

    Authors: Jinming Xu, Yan Wang, Jiahao Jiang, Cong Yin and Bentao Shi
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:56
  9. Deterioration of normal intestinal epithelial cells is crucial for colorectal tumorigenesis. However, the process of epithelial cell deterioration and molecular networks that contribute to this process remain ...

    Authors: Xiaoqi Huang, Chongyin Han, Jiayuan Zhong, Jiaqi Hu, Yabin Jin, Qinqin Zhang, Wei Luo, Rui Liu and Fei Ling
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:45
  10. Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is a deadly gastrointestinal malignancy, and chemotherapy resistance is a key factor leading to its poor prognosis. M2 tumor-associated macrophages (M2-TAMs) may be an...

    Authors: Kaige Yang, Yufang Xie, Lele Xue, Fanping Li, Chenghua Luo, Weihua Liang, Haijun Zhang, Ya Li, Yilin Ren, Mengmeng Zhao, Weinan Wang, Jia Liu, Xihua Shen, Wenhu Zhou, Jing Fei, Weigang Chen…
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:26
  11. Gastric cancer (GC) is the fifth most common cancer and the third most common cause of cancer death worldwide. Plant homeodomain (PHD)-finger domain protein PHF5A has been demonstrated to play a promoting role...

    Authors: Zhandong Zhang, Liangqun Peng, Wei Yang, Baodong Li, Yawei Hua and Suxia Luo
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2023 21:5
  12. Solid tumors are stiffer than their surrounding normal tissues; however, their interior stiffness is not uniform. Under certain conditions, cancer cells can acquire stem-like phenotypes. However, it remains un...

    Authors: Jiayun Wei, Jia Yao, Chendong Yang, Yongcui Mao, Dan Zhu, Ye Xie, Pinyan Liu, Mengchao Yan, Longfei Ren, Yan Lin, Qiuxia Zheng and Xun Li
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:555
  13. The tumour microenvironment and cirrhotic liver are excellent sources of cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs), which participate in carcinogenesis. Thus, it is important to clarify the crosstalk between CAFs a...

    Authors: Jungang Zhao, Rizhao Li, Jiacheng Li, Ziyan Chen, Zixia Lin, Baofu Zhang, Liming Deng, Gang Chen and Yi Wang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:520
  14. Pancreatic cancer (PC) is a highly malignant tumor which threatens human’s health. Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) are implicated in many cancers, including PC, but their mechanisms in PC have not yet been enti...

    Authors: Dandan Yu, Zhigang Zhao, Li Wang, Shishi Qiao, Zhen Yang, Qiang Wen and Guanghui Zhu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:511
  15. Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the most common and malignant tumors in the digestive tract. Tumor Suppressor Candidate 3 (TUSC3) is one subunit of the endoplasmic reticulum Oligosaccharyl transferase...

    Authors: Ruxia Deng, Xiansheng Lu, Chang Hong, Rui Cai, Ping Wang, Le Xiong, Xiaoyu Wang, Qiaoyu Chen and Jie Lin
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:485
  16. Metastasis is the primary cause of cancer-related mortality. Metastasis involves a complex multistep process during which individual tumor cells spread primarily through destruction of the endothelial barrier,...

    Authors: Guoxin Zhang, Mengyuan Li, Dandan Zhou, Xingjiu Yang, Wenlong Zhang and Ran Gao
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:446
  17. Adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC) is an extremely rare, aggressive tumor with few effective therapeutic options or drugs. Mitotane (Mtn), which is the only authorized therapeutic drug, came out in 1970 and is sti...

    Authors: Liwen Ren, Yihui Yang, Wan Li, Xiangjin Zheng, Jinyi Liu, Sha Li, Hong Yang, Yizhi Zhang, Binbin Ge, Sen Zhang, Weiqi Fu, Dexin Dong, Guanhua Du and Jinhua Wang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:444
  18. Gallbladder cancer (GBC) is a highly aggressive malignant cancer in the biliary system with poor prognosis. XPO1 (chromosome region maintenance 1 or CRM1) mediates the nuclear export of several proteins, mainl...

    Authors: Cheng Zhao, Zi-yi Yang, Jian Zhang, Ou Li, Shi-lei Liu, Chen Cai, Yi-jun Shu, Li-jia Pan, Wei Gong and Ping Dong
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:434
  19. Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is one of the most severe cancers and is characterized by chemotherapy resistance and poor prognosis associated with epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT). In a prev...

    Authors: Yuto Kubo, Koji Tanaka, Yasunori Masuike, Tsuyoshi Takahashi, Kotaro Yamashita, Tomoki Makino, Takuro Saito, Kazuyoshi Yamamoto, Tomoyuki Tsujimoto, Takashi Harino, Yukinori Kurokawa, Makoto Yamasaki, Kiyokazu Nakajima, Hidetoshi Eguchi and Yuichiro Doki
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:383
  20. Osteosarcoma is one of the most malignant tumors, and it occurs mostly in children and adolescents. Currently, surgery and chemotherapy are the main treatments. The recurrence rate is high and the prognosis is...

    Authors: Wenhao Chen, Yuxiang Lin, Meichen Jiang, Qingshui Wang and Qiang Shu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:355
  21. PolyC-RNA-binding protein 1 (PCBP1) functions as a tumour suppressor and RNA regulator that is downregulated in human cancers. Here, we aimed to reveal the biological function of PCBP1 in lung adenocarcinoma (...

    Authors: Yujia Zheng, Zheng Zhou, Ran Wei, Chu Xiao, Hao Zhang, Tao Fan, Bo Zheng, Chunxiang Li and Jie He
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:343
  22. Glutamine is the most abundant amino acid in the body and plays a vital role in colorectal cancer (CRC) cell metabolism. However, limited studies have investigated the clinical and prognostic significance of p...

    Authors: Hongyan Sun, Chuan Zhang, Yang Zheng, Chenlu Liu, Xue Wang and Xianling Cong
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:330
  23. Recent studies have shown that the fox family plays a vital role in tumorigenesis and progression. Forkhead Box S1 (FOXS1), as a newly identified subfamily of the FOX family, is overexpressed in certain types ...

    Authors: Liang Zhang, Chuan-fu Ren, Zhi Yang, Long-bo Gong, Chao Wang, Min Feng and Wen-xian Guan
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:327
  24. Circular RNAs (circRNAs) belong to a novel class of noncoding RNA that gained more attention in human cancer pathogenesis. The role of circRNA in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is largely unclear. P...

    Authors: Pei Xu, Lei Wang, Qingtao Liu, Pengkai Gao, Fengqing Hu, Xiao Xie, Lianyong Jiang, Rui Bi, Fangbao Ding, Qi Yang and Haibo Xiao
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:318
  25. Acute Myeloid Leukaemia (AML) is a haematological malignancy showing a hypervariable landscape of clinical outcomes and phenotypic differences, explainable by heterogeneity at the cellular and molecular level....

    Authors: Gabriele Lo Iudice, Eleonora De Bellis, Arianna Savi, Luca Guarnera, Alice Massacci, Francesca De Nicola, Frauke Goeman, Tiziana Ottone, Mariadomenica Divona, Matteo Pallocca, Maurizio Fanciulli, Maria Teresa Voso and Gennaro Ciliberto
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:311
  26. Tumour-derived exosomes have recently been shown to participate in the formation and progression of different cancer processes, including tumour microenvironment remodelling, angiogenesis, invasion, metastasis...

    Authors: Qiang Song, Hao Yu, Yidong Cheng, Jie Han, Kai Li, Juntao Zhuang, Qiang Lv, Xiao Yang and Haiwei Yang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:308
  27. Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a common malignant tumor with a high risk of metastasis. Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) have been reported to be implicated in cancer progression via regulating its nearby gene. Here...

    Authors: Yuliang Pan, Yuxing Zhu, Jun Zhang, Long Jin and Peiguo Cao
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:287
  28. Previous studies have indicated that chronic emotional stressors likely participate in the occurrence of cancers. However, direct evidence connecting stress and colorectal cancer development remains almost com...

    Authors: Zili Zhou, Yan Shu, Haijun Bao, Shengbo Han, Zhengyi Liu, Ning Zhao, Wenzheng Yuan, Chenxing Jian and Xiaogang Shu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:262
  29. Lymphatic metastasis was an independent prognostic risk factor for hypopharyngeal carcinoma and was the main cause of treatment failure. The purpose of this study was to screen the differential genes and inves...

    Authors: Yanshi Li, Min Pan, Tao Lu, Dan Yu, Chuan Liu, Zhihai Wang and Guohua Hu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:255
  30. An increasing number of studies have demonstrated that long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) serve as key regulators in tumor development and progression. However, only a few lncRNAs have been functionally characteri...

    Authors: Jixu Wang, Futao Hou, Lusheng Tang, Ke Xiao, Tengfei Yang, Zhiqiang Wang and Gu Liu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:220
  31. NOS1 expression predicts poor prognosis in patients with melanoma. However, the molecular function of NOS1 in the type I IFN response and immune escape of melanoma is still unknown.

    Authors: Xi Chen, Zhiwei Zou, Qianli Wang, Wenwen Gao, Sisi Zeng, Shuangyan Ye, Pengfei Xu, Mengqiu Huang, Keyi Li, Jianping Chen, Zhuo Zhong, Qianbing Zhang, Bingtao Hao and Qiuzhen Liu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:205
  32. Knowledge of the role of CYP2E1 in hepatocarcinogenesis is largely based on epidemiological and animal studies, with a primary focus on the role of CYP2E1 in metabolic activation of procarcinogens. Few studies...

    Authors: Lili Zhu, Xiaobei Yang, Jingyu Feng, Jian Mao, Qidong Zhang, Mengru He, Yang Mi, Yingwu Mei, Ge Jin and Haifeng Zhang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:194
  33. Triosephosphate isomerase 1 (TPI1), as a key glycolytic enzyme, is upregulated in multiple cancers. However, expression profile and regulatory mechanism of TPI1 in breast cancer (BRCA) remain mysterious.

    Authors: Xiaoying Jin, Dandan Wang, Mengxia Lei, Yan Guo, Yuqing Cui, Fengzhi Chen, Weiling Sun and Xuesong Chen
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:191
  34. Studies have revealed an important role of activating transcription factor 1 (ATF1) and phosphorylated ATF1 at Ser63 in tumors. Our previous study identified Thr184 as a novel phosphorylation site of ATF1. How...

    Authors: Tong Li, Huiyuan Cao, Sa Wu, Peimin Zhong, Jie Ding, Jing Wang, Fangfang Wang, Zhiwei He and Guo-Liang Huang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:169
  35. Metastasis is critical for endometrial cancer (EC) progression and prognosis. Accumulating evidence suggests that circular RNAs (circRNAs) can operate as independent functional entities. However, the functiona...

    Authors: Rui Shi, Wei Zhang, Jun Zhang, Zhicheng Yu, Lanfen An, Rong Zhao, Xing Zhou, Ziwei Wang, Sitian Wei and Hongbo Wang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:139
  36. Prostate cancer is the second most common cancer in men, and some new target genes are needed to predict the risk of prostate cancer progression and the treatment.

    Authors: Xing-cheng Wu, Yu-zhong Yu, Yu-zhi Zuo, Xian-Lu Song, Zhi-en Zhou, Yu Xiao, Dao-sheng Luo, Wei-gang Yan and Shan-Chao Zhao
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:91
  37. Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-beta/delta (PPARδ) was considered as the key regulator involved in the evolution of various tumors. Given that PPARδ potential role in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) ...

    Authors: Wei Han, Nan Wang, Rui Kong, Wen Bao and Jie Lu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:86
  38. Papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) is one of most prevalent malignant endocrine neoplasms, and it is associated with a high frequency of BRAF gene mutations, which lead to lymphatic metastasis and distant metas...

    Authors: Xing Chen, Shan Lin, Ying Lin, Songsong Wu, Minling Zhuo, Ailong Zhang, Junjie Zheng and Zhenhui You
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:79
  39. Adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC) is an aggressive and rare malignant tumor and is prone to local invasion and metastasis. And, overexpressed Centromere Protein F (CENPF) is closely related to the oncogenesis of ...

    Authors: Yu-gang Huang, Dan Li, Li Wang, Xiao-min Su and Xian-bin Tang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:78
  40. Emerging evidence suggests that long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) play important roles in the metastasis and recurrence of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). A kinds of lncRNAs were found to be involved in regulatin...

    Authors: Zhanjun Chen, Leyang Xiang, Longhai Li, Huohui Ou, Yinghao Fang, Yuyan Xu, Qin Liu, Zhigang Hu, Yu Huang, Xianghong Li and Dinghua Yang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:75
  41. Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) are involved in the development of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). We aimed to investigate the function of LINC01146 in HCC.

    Authors: Xiaoyun Ma, Meile Mo, Chao Tan, Jennifer Hui Juan Tan, Huishen Huang, Bihu Liu, Dongping Huang, Shun Liu, Xiaoyun Zeng and Xiaoqiang Qiu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:57
  42. Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is characterized by high morbidity and mortality and is difficult to cure. Renal interstitial fibrosis (RIF) is a major determinant of, and commonly occurs within, CKD progression....

    Authors: Jieqing Zhou, Hong Jiang, Hongkun Jiang, Yan Fan, Jing Zhang, Xiaoxue Ma, Xuewei Yang, Yu Sun and Xing Zhao
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:54
  43. Cervical cancer (CC) is one of the most common gynecological tumors that threatens women's health and lives. Aberrant expression of PIWI-interacting RNA (piRNA) is closely related with a range of cancers and c...

    Authors: Qi Xie, Zhen Li, Xiao Luo, Dan Wang, Yao Zhou, Jingge Zhao, Suhua Gao, Yongguang Yang, Wanying Fu, Lingfei Kong and Tingyi Sun
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:51
  44. FOXA1 is associated with malignant tumors, but the function of FOXA1 in EOC is unclear. HDAC3 can influence the proliferation, migration and invasion ability of EOC. In this study, we wanted to explore the fun...

    Authors: Tong Lou, Chongdong Liu, Hong Qu, Zhiqiang Zhang, Shuzhen Wang and Huiyu Zhuang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:19
  45. Cytidine nucleotide triphosphate synthase 1 (CTPS1) is a CTP synthase which play critical roles in DNA synthesis. However, its biological regulation and mechanism in triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) has no...

    Authors: Yuxiang Lin, Jie Zhang, Yan Li, Wenhui Guo, Lili Chen, Minyan Chen, Xiaobin Chen, Wenzhe Zhang, Xuan Jin, Meichen Jiang, Han Xiao, Chuan Wang, Chuangui Song and Fangmeng Fu
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:17
  46. Exosomes, membranous nanovesicles, naturally bringing proteins, mRNAs, and microRNAs (miRNAs), play crucial roles in tumor pathogenesis. This study was to investigate the role of miR-155-3p from M2 macrophages...

    Authors: Li Song, Bin Luan, Qingrong Xu, Ruihe Shi and Xiufang Wang
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2022 20:13
  47. LINC00491 was involved in some tumors development, but its function in liver cancer has not been reported. This study aimed to investigate LINC00491 expression and function in liver cancer progression.

    Authors: Wei Wang, Tao Yang, Dongsheng Li, Yinpeng Huang, Guang Bai and Qing Li
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2021 19:504
  48. Breast cancer remains one of the most dreadful female malignancies globally, in which cancer stem cells (CSCs) play crucial functions. Circular RNAs have drawn great attention in cancer research area and propo...

    Authors: Yi-Ping Liu, Jin-Yu Heng, Xin-Yu Zhao and En-You Li
    Citation: Journal of Translational Medicine 2021 19:467